Forging On
by drakon49
Summary: The UNSC Infinity finds itself stranded on a world dominated by oceans and pirates. An ODST and his friend a Sangheili Swordsman get separated from their ship. What adventures are there to be had. And will the crew of the infinity survive?
1. Chapter 1

**Authors note: ok everyone this is now my second story on the site. And officially the very first Halo and One Piece crossover on the site. And for those of you who have been waiting for one your welcome. Joking aside I would like to say that this story will focus heavily on two OC's so if that bothers anyone, well to bad. This first chapter really won't have any One Piece elements in it primarily because this is to set up the story. It wouldn't make sense if i didn't do this chapter. I will attempt to update the story at least once a month. Oh and before I forget this takes place after the events in Halo 5 so spoiler warning.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece or Halo.**

Alarms blared in the bridge of The Infinity. Chaos had broken out within the ship people running back and forth trying to keep humanity's most advanced ship functional. "Sir the Guardian has spotted us" The ship's AI informed the captain.

"I can see that Roland" captain Laskey spoke as another EMP Rocked the ship. "How are our shields holding up?!"

"That last pulse took our shields down to 67% we can't take much more of this." Laskey growled at the blow to their defenses.

"Roland tell me we got Chief and The Arbiter?"

" Yes sir we got the spartans off Sanghelios as well as the Arbiter and some of his men."

"That's the only good news I've gotten all day." he muttered to himself then asked "What's there ETA Roland?"

"It'll be another ten minutes before they reach the Infinity At this rate the ship won't last that long" Another EMP tore through the ship several systems shut off before powering back up. "That just dropped our shields to 35% sir."

Laskey pounded his fist onto the display. "I want all the power we can spare put into the shields ASAP we need to out last this thing." He looked at the metal monstrosity attacking them. Even the Infinty couldn't stand up to the forerunner war machine for long. Their only saving grace was that it was trying to cripple them and not destroy them if it was they would be dead already.

"Roland! How much longer can our shields hold out?"

"5 maybe 6 minutes tops it'll barely be enough time for the them to get aboard."

"That'll have to work prep the slipspace engine we'll need to make a blind jump as soon as they're on board."

Cortana's voice suddenly echoed over the intercom. In an exceedingly calm tone she said "You can't hide from me soon you will be unable to do a thing. And John will see the perfect world I intend to build"

Another pulse slammed into their shields. Causing the entire ship to shake. "Shields down to 17% sir one more hit and the ship is dead."

"Are they on board yet?"

"Yes they just landed in the hangar."

"Than get us out of here before they shoot us down."

The ship turned and began flying away from the Guardian the familiar void of slipspace appearing in front of them. As they accelerated through the portal they heard a distressed scream came from the intercoms. "NO! You can't take him away from me" The Guardian charged a massive laser before firing at the fleeing ship. The weapon tore through the Infinity's remaining shields and obliterated the primary engines. The Infinity was sent hurtling into the rift.

"Shit! Roland! Damage report now!"

"That last attack rendered most of our systems useless and completely destroyed our engines. To make things worse we are now hurtling through slipspace completely helpless. Until the Slipspace drive can be brought back online we'll be stuck here."

"How long do you think that will take."

"I already have Halsey and our best men working on it shouldn't be more than an hour. Though when it does come back online there is no telling where we'll exit at."

"Which means we could end up in another forerunner installation for all we know." Laskey finished for the AI "Cortana and her Guardians would be on us in seconds if that were the case." Laskey looked at the black void out the viewport. He sighed he was running out of options. " Roland get Blue team and Osiris up here as soon as possible. They need to know about our predicament." He seemed to consider something for a brief moment before making another request. " Have the Arbiter meet me in my office I need to discuss our options with him."

Roland replied "right away sir"

Laskey nodded and exited the command center.

" Hey V you in there." The 8 foot Sangheili growled as his peaceful mood was disturbed. His mandibles flared out slightly in annoyance.

"Yes I'm in here Alex though must you insist on calling me that."The door to the room opened revealing a six foot ODST standing in the doorway decked out in his black combat armor while holding his helmet by his side.

"But of course my dear friend V is so much easier to pronounce than Vykan after all."

"When we first met you only called me that because you couldn't say Vykan Rafamai: my actual name. Now you insist on calling me that because it irritates me" he replied dryly. While turning back to his work on his blade.

Alex waved off the comment and made a rather sarcastic remark of his own. "Oh Vykan! I would never do such a thing." The two shared a short laugh before moving on to a more serious subject. Alex seemed to turn serious which was a drastic contradiction to his usual carefree attitude. "Anyway I came down to tell you that the ship will be stuck in slipspace for the time being. At least until they can fix the drive."

Vykan turned to his friend " I'm going to assume that that is the least of our worries. Based on your expression."

Alex snorted "You could say that again that last attack rendered the engines useless. And Roland estimates that depending on where we drop out it could take anywhere from a year to several years of repairs and that's just if we don't land in the middle of a forerunner stronghold."

The two looked distressed at the news. Alex eventually shook himself out of it before addressing Vykan once again. "Anyway that's all I came down here for I knew you wouldn't hear the announcement down in the cargo hold." A teasing smile took its place on his face. "Honestly do you have to come down here sulk every time we lose a fight. Why don't you come up and socialize with us instead."

The Sangheili's equivalent of a smile appeared on his friends face. " and why would i do that when i have all of the crates down here to keep me company." The solemn mood now broken the two friends continued to converse about trivial things for the remainder of their time in the belly of the ship.

Laskey stood by the holographic table analyzing the broken model of his ship. Thel stood by his side ready to give his input on the situation if need be. The massive alien stood in his regal golden armor looking at the ship as well contemplating their limited options. He glanced over at the Human captain observing the look of desperation that both leaders were beginning to feel. "Captain I believe that the only safe option for us is to remain in slipspace." Laskey glanced over at the alien

"That may be true Arbiter but you know as well as i do that if we do remain here we won't be able to do anything. To make things worse we will eventually run out of supplies and be forced to drop out."

Thel looked down at the display once more. "Though I am loath to admit it Laskey our only option is to drop out of slipspace. I hang onto the hope that we will find a suitable place for repairs. Though it is much more likely we will be captured by the guardians. Living under those machines is not a fate I would wish on anyone of my friends on this ship." Laskey nodded considering The Arbiters words. Then looked up as Commander Palmer approached them.

"You need something Commander."

"I was sent to tell you that the slipspace drive is in good enough condition to get us back into regular space. However doing so will cripple it even more because we don't have the necessary supplies to repair it on board. We'll be truly stuck wherever we land without the engines or the drive." She stood at attention in front of the captain waiting for his response.

Laskey looked around at the people in the small meeting room. Finally he decided to dismiss everyone with the exception of The Arbiter and the Spartan standing across from him. " This doesn't leave this room you two need to understand we are in a very precarious situation if the crew learns of what i'm about to say than there would be chaos. That includes you Roland."

The orange avatar of the AI appeared on the holotable with a somewhat hurt expression. "Sir you know I would never do anything so reckless especially not in our current situation."

"I know I just had to be sure." he said with a stressed look on his face. " Can you please get Chief up here he needs to hear this to."

" I'll call for him right now Captain." Roland replied

After several minutes of waiting the four occupants of the room where joined by a fifth. The Chief walked in with his signature green armor and now cracked orange visor. "You called for me Sir?" he said in his deep raspy voice.

"Thank you for coming John. I appreciate you taking the time after all that you have been through over the past couple weeks." The chief stayed silent after being addressed. The Captain sighed. "Can you please take off the helmet John I need to say this to your face." He hesitated slightly before reluctantly reaching up and removing his helmet. Revealing his aging face and blue eyes that spoke of years of experience.

After setting his helmet down he looked at the captain expectantly. "John just as I told everyone here what I am about to say does not leave this room is that clear." A nod from the stoic man was all the answer Laskey needed. "Ok as you all know we can now exit slipspace if we so desired but in truth our dilemma is far more complex than that. As i'm sure most of the crew has realised by now." He tapped on the holotable and brought up a 3d model of the Infinity. "The model we were looking at before was downgrading the damage. This is the actual condition our ship is in." The model he showed revealed that all of the main engines had been ripped off by the attack. Leaving a gaping hole in the rear of the ship. "We had to lockdown the entire area as soon as the attack hit to prevent our atmosphere from escaping meaning we lost a lot of people to the guardian. The crew knows that much at least but I had to assure them our engines were still attached in order to prevent panic. At the moment they think our engines need heavy repairs rather than the fact that we have to replace them entirely." The other three people in the room stared at the model in sorrow and regret.

The Arbiter was the first to speak "So our situation is truly a lost cause we have no means to defend ourselves and no way to repair such extensive damage."

"That Isn't entirely true Thel" Laskey said addressing the Sangheili by name. "The ship may be lost but there is a way to possibly save our men and believe me if I felt we had any other option i would readily take it."

"What are you proposing Captain?" Palmer asked.

The defeated expression on his face gave the other occupants an idea of what he had in mind. "I know none of you want to hear this but if we drop out of slipspace in a heavy forerunner area or when they find us I believe the only way to save the crew is to let them take us." They began to object but the Captain quickly silenced them. "I hate it as much as you do but we have to think about this logically. Cortana won't kill us as long as John is on board we can use that to our advantage. The crew can be sent out ahead of us and john can be the last to leave the ship."

Thel looked at him in disbelief. " you cannot be serious we may be saved but we would be slaves to the construct that's something my kin could not tolerate and i will not allow. My people would gladly die in this ship fighting than be forced into servitude."

"And what would that accomplish Arbiter!" Laskey snapped "Our men would die in vain once they managed to stop the Spartans and get John off the ship the rest of us would be blown to pieces by the Guardians! At least with my plan we would survive so that we could fight another day." he slumped down into a chair the others looking at him in surprise over the sudden outburst. "I'm not saying we would sit back and let them control us. What I am suggesting is we get captured then take our time study their weaknesses and eventually stage a rebellion. In addition with living Spartans and the leader of The Swords" he nodded at The Arbiter "That would inspire many of the people to fight by our side.

Thel looked unsure of himself he wished to deny the plan but the rational side of him could see its merit. Finally making up his mind he released a dejected sigh. "I can see the reason behind this plan, but you must know that my people will not stand idly for long. Our pride will not let us suffer this fate for long."

A look of relief crossed Laskey's face. "Thank you Arbiter that's reassuring." He then turned to Palmer and The Chief. "I need to hear you're opinion on this."

Commander Palmer seemed to think on it for a while before answering the request. She sighed in irritation. "Captain I trust your judgement It's just comforting to me to know that we may still have a chance if we go through with this.

Everyone turned to John in anticipation for his answer. He looked around the room at the others debating with himself on what he should finally turned to the captain. "Sir I don't think Cortana can be trusted. She's unstable she wants to destroy every pocket of resistance no matter how small that includes us. In addition she'll do anything to get to me so that I can see her "Perfect World"."

The three others looked at him somewhat surprised at the long answer. Thel was the one that responded. "You and the construct were very close during our friendship I came to see this, but you cannot allow this to sway you Spartan." Laskey looked at The Sangheili before adding his own thoughts.

"Thel is right John Cortana may have been your closest friend and her betrayal is weighing on you that much i can tell. You have to remember though that her intentions are good even if she isn't going about it in the right way. In a weird twisted kind of way she is doing this for you she wants to make a world where you can be at peace. She won't hurt us as long as we go quietly."

John looked down at his feet and a long silence passed. "Captain she wants to imprison me and my team until her new world comes to pass. I won't be able to help you."

The captain looked apologetic towards the Spartan. "I know you don't like it Chief and neither do I but this is our only hope of victory if we do come out on top though you have my word that we will free you." He looked hesitant for a split second before recovering. "And if we don't succeed then you and your team get to experience the peace you deserve for all you have done for us."

John stood in front of the others looking at each one carefully. After several tense seconds he placed his helmet back on with a hiss as it sealed. He then turned around and left the room without another word. Quietly shutting the door behind him.

Laskey was the first to recover "He'll never admit it mainly because he doesn't understand it himself but he is in a lot of pain when he thought he had lost her he was absolutely devastated he took on mission to distract himself. Blue team helped lessen the blow with their he found out she was alive he would do anything to get her back and he did. Only to find out what she had become. I think he is extremely conflicted. His morals are fighting with the desire to be with one of his only friends."

With a solemn look the Arbiter said. "It pains me to see such a strong warrior in such a state much more so that I consider him my friend."

Laskey looked regretfully at the table in front of him for what he was about to do. "Roland drop us out of slipspace."

The depressed voice of the AI responded over a speaker. "Okay Sir we'll drop out as soon as you reach the bridge." Thanking the AI the Captain Laskey got up and exited the room trying to look strong for the men he passed by on his way.

Thel looked at the Spartan standing next to him "Your Captain is a great leader if only he could realise that himself." A nod from Palmer was all he got before they both left.

Laskey sat down in the Captain's chair mentally preparing himself for what was to come. Rolands voice sounded over the Ship's coms. "Exiting slipspace in 3-2-1." With a sickening lurch the craft returned to real space. Recovering quickly Laskey asked the AI if he had any indication of where they were. "I'm not sure Sir this system doesn't match any known one's the upside though is that as far as our sensors can tell there is no forerunner presence here."

A look of extreme relief appeared on the Captain's face. "That's good to here ok Roland what can you tell me about this place. Are there any resources we can use for repairs."

"Well the system has a typical sun like star with five planets orbiting it their is a large asteroid belt between the second and third planet that we can use to harvest resources. There is something more important though at the moment."

"What might That be?"

"The third planet's atmosphere is nearly identical to earth's and is almost completely covered in oceans. However it's the island that dot its surface that are important they are completely covered in dense foliage."

"Good Job Roland we can use it as a base of operations while the infinity is repaired."

"Well yes we could sir but I wasn't finished currently we are caught in its Gravity well There is a chance we will only be caught in an orbit but that is a slim one. At our current trajectory we'll crash into the surface. Now normally we could stop our descent but …"

"All our engines are out." Laskey finished in realization. He yelled at the AI the Urgency getting to him. "How long until impact."

"We have 20 minutes until we hit the atmosphere at that point evacuation will be too dangerous."  
"Alright Roland send out a ship wide alert I want everyone on pelicans and phantoms ASAP! We can't lose anymore men than we already have." The crew began scrambling out of the bridge when alarms started sounding. "You need to come to Roland can you eject your chip so i can take you with me." At those words a small glowing orange chip slid out from the console in front of him. He grabbed the chip and proceeded to follow his men to evacuate.

Alex Newman honestly didn't think it could get any worse than this. Plummeting towards an unknown planet in a 3 mile long ship certainly wasn't something he would ever want to do again if he could help it. Honestly if Vykan didn't insist on hanging out in the one place on this fucking ship that didn't have coms than neither of them would even be in this mess they would have been off this hunk of metal at the same time that everyone else was. "Come on" he yelled back at his friend "The hangar is this way" The ship quaked under their feet as it hit the atmosphere.

They both were jarred around violently but Alex quickly recovered and began running again. He looked back to make sure his friend was still following him. Only to see the Sangheili lying on the ground with a massive chunk of debris lodged in his leg. He ran back to him tearing a large piece of cloth out of his uniform so that he could stop the purple blood from leaking out of the injury. He left the shard of metal in his friend's leg and wrapped the cloth around it making a rather hasty bandage. He hefted the heavy alien up and draped his arm over his shoulder so that he could support him. A grunt escaped his lips from the extra weight. "You Should leave me we'll never make it out like this."

Alex replied as he helped his friend down the rattling hallway. "I can't just leave you we're friends we watch each other's back. Besides the hangar is just around the corner." they reached the hangar and the duo hobbled over to one of the few remaining pelicans. Alex unceremoniously threw his pained friend into the copilot seat before taking the controls himself. He ran through the start up sequence as fast as possible. As the engines sputtered to life he pulled out of the hangar at a high speed. The pelican shot away from the burning wreckage dodging debris as much as possible. It was a vain attempt on alex's part though. A stray chunk of armor tore through the pelicans left wing. Sending it into a violent plunge towards the water below. He tried to steer them towards any form of land he could find. His saving grace being when he spotted a large jungle island off to their right. Using the remaining engines he steered them towards the green island. As they accelerated towards the island he slowly realized that they might not survive this

He looked over at the unconscious alien trying not to wonder if things would have been better if he had left him behind. He knew for a fact that he would never be able to forgive himself if he had done that. So in slight acceptance Alex looked at the ground that was rushing towards. He silently prayed to any god that might exist that he and his friend might survive this. As the Pelican hit the first branches his head was sent flying into the dashboard in front of him. And soon after a world of blackness welcomed him.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's note: Ok looking over the last chapter I'll admit I'm a bit disappointed in it mainly because it seemed somewhat rushed. In any case i'll try to improve. So here's the second chapter everyone. And please tell me what you think.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece or Halo**

Alex and Vykan had been stranded on this damn island for weeks now. And as a result they had run out of food to eat during their stay. Initially it hadn't been so bad they had found some biofoam and a first aid kit in the ruined pelican. As a result Vykan was making a fast recovery though the wound on his leg would still bleed profusely when provoked. At first Alex was grateful that the two had lived through the crash but he was starting to rethink that conclusion primarily because starvation seemed a much slower and more painful death than the crash would have been.

Of course they hadn't reached that point yet but they were on the path heading in that direction, and at this point he firmly believed that they would both kill if it meant something other than the standard rations they had found in the pelican. Vykan walked up behind the brooding human who had taken to dismantling and reassembling the magnum he always had by his side. "You're doing that thing again." Vykan stated in exasperation.

Alex shot an intense glare at his friend who had decided to sit next to him on the pelicans wind shield. "It's not like I have anything better to do."

"We could search the island again I am sure there are things we have not found yet." Vykan said with an optimistic air to him.

Alex after reassembling the Magnum for the hundredth tim that morning set it aside and laid back against the windshield. "V you know as well as I do that we have seen the vast majority if not all of this island. There are no large animals that would even begin to feed us and as far as I know all of the fruit that we have seen on this island are inedible, whether because of poisons or other reasons." Alex said in response.

Vykan looked at his friend with worry during the past weeks his usual carefree and joking self had disappeared. Now there was just a bitter 25 year old man left. Usually he was the more serious of the two. But he found himself more often than not trying to bring Alex's hopes up. It worked sometimes but other times it only seemed to put him in an even more sour he pushed on for the sake of his friend. "I can see what you are saying but remember that ruined village we found as well. It means this island was inhabited once and there is still hope if slim that someone will find us."

Alex almost smiled at his friends conviction. "You know I honestly wish I could say the same thing but at this rate I'll starve within a week and you would follow soon after. Since you Sangheili can go longer without food than humans can. I'm sorry if it's discouraging but I'm just trying to be realistic." Alex didn't want to cause Vykan any more pain than the both of them were already in but they had eaten the last of their food yesterday. Now they had already gone a day without food and Alex couldn't help but feel hopeless.

The two sat in peaceful silence for several minutes before Alex slowly got up from his spot and looked out at the forest surrounding them. "Ok V you stay here I'm going to see if I can find anything edible out there." With that said he grabbed his magnum and loaded it before carefully jogging out into the dense foliage.

Vykan watched the human leave through the forest thinking about where he might look. He would probably search in all the places they had looked before. He would probably also look inside the crumbling wall that they had found earlier that week. They hadn't searched their because He couldn't scale it with his injury. But Alex could get over it if he wasn't there to hold him back.

Alex carefully chose each foothold as he scaled the dilapidated wall so far he had been doing well in his opinion. At that thought the handhold he had just grabbed onto gave way under his weight. Resulting in a several foot drop before he latched onto a brick that was sticking out of the wall. Saving himself from the deadly fall. "Me and my big fat mouth." he muttered to himself as he resumed the slow progression. As he climbed his mind began to wander off about how needlessly tall the old wall was. It was a good 50 feet off the ground at the top. Whatever culture had built it was very primitive. Based on what he had seen the wall was actually fairly new considering the village they had found was much older in comparison. That meant that the locals of this planet were at least six centuries behind The UNSC in terms of technology if this form of protection was still useful.

Finally after what seemed like forever he clambered over the side of the wall and unceremoniously fell on his back in the middle of a small pathway at the top. He laid there for several minutes panting from the exertion. "I swear if that isn't worth whatever is back here…"

He stopped himself with a growl to keep from growing to angry. He got up slowly his body aching after his climb. His sore arms latched onto the small barrier separating him from the edge and he hoisted himself up.

The sight before him made his spirits drop considerably and had him fuming as he looked on at the barren field below. The only sign of life was a small tree sitting on a small mound of dirt. He made his way over to the steps next to the large gate. "you've got to be kidding me I climb all the way up here and all their is is one pathetic excuse for a tree in the middle of a wasteland!" he ranted to himself. "How dare I get my hopes up that perhaps there was something edible here. But no! Nothing but some dirt and a tree that is shorter than me and collapsing under it's own weight." Glad to have that off his chest Alex decided that he would search the place for storage rooms or at least anything useful.

He started by the gate and made his way slowly around the structure. Searching every crack and seem in the wall in hopes that they could find something to eat. He searched for trapdoor on the walkways secret entrances in the walls anything that could lead him to something useful.

After hours of thoroughly search of the entire place he reached one conclusion. That this wall was only built to protect one very pathetic little tree. Which was pointless in his opinion, but maybe there was something special about it. He walked over to the small thing closely examining it. The only thing even a little special about it was the massive red apple that was pulling it into the ground.

The large fruit itself was at least the size of a watermelon and was covered in a strange rippling pattern. He pulled the massive fruit off of its branch and set it down so he could look at it more closely.

Besides the pattern and miraculous size it looked just like a regular apple. It was most likely harmless but he could never be to sure. He took out his combat knife and cut a small wedge off the fruit. It looked like an apple on the inside as well. He stared at the fruit intensely trying to decide if it was safe or not.

"Ah what the hell at least I won't starve if this kills me." With that final thought he stuck the small piece in his mouth,and almost immediately regretted it. He nearly choked the thing back up it tasted so bad. But he forced himself to swallow it anyway. "That had to be one of the single most disgusting things I have ever eaten. But as long as I'm not dead by morning it should let us last a couple more days." making his decision he put the apple into the bag he had brought along and made his way up the stairs. He looked over the edge of the wall and mentally prepared himself for the long climb down.

He carefully hauled himself over the edge making sure that each foothold was stable before putting his weight on it. He kept on like this until he reached the halfway point. He had done what he had been doing the whole way down but as soon as he put his weight on the small brick it broke and sent him into a twenty-five foot drop. A startled scream slipped from his lips before he braced himself for the impact. He felt it he felt the fruit get crushed as he landed on his back. But after the landing he just sat their looking up into the sky wide eyed. He had felt the impact alright but there was one thing he just couldn't wrap his mind around. It didn't hurt not even a little in fact he felt almost... energized?

Vykan was beginning to grow worried. Alex had been gone for several hours now and night would soon be upon them. He paced in front of the pelican despite his limp. Attempting to alleviate some of his concerns. Unfortunately it wasn't helping as much as he had hoped. He tried to remind himself that Alex would have called him on the radio if he was in any trouble.

His friend finally returned after another half an hour of his nervous pacing. But he had a very troubled mood emanating off of him. "Did something happen while you were searching?" Vykan asked.

Alex looked up at him only barely registering the question. Realizing he had been addressed he shook himself out of his stupor. "Vykan I honestly don't know what the hell happened to me. I fell a good 25 feet off of that wall but I'm still standing here and even more so I don't even have a scratch to prove it. But that isn't the weirdest part after I hit the ground not only did it not hurt but I felt great better than I did before I took the fall." The Sangheili looked at him incredulously not thinking such a thing was possible.

"Oh you must be joking that is not possible despite what you might want to think." Vykan was beginning to question his friends mental state. If he genuinely thought such a thing could happen.

"I'm telling the truth dammit! Just listen to me I don't know why it happened but it did in fact I can prove it there is a camera built into my armor i'll get into it and show it to you." The two entered the pelican and after a good ten minutes of messing with the camera and wiring he managed to produce a short video for them to watch. Vykan was even more confused now that his friend had shown him what happened he should at least have several broken bones after such a fall and yet he was standing before him unscathed.

Vykan shook his head trying not to overthink things. "I don't know how this happened but just be thankful it did." He looked up at the darkening sky before turning back to Alex. "We should rest for the night we can ponder this issue more tomorrow if you like."

Alex sighed and was content to sleep for now after the kind of day he had had.

Vykan was woken by angry shouts from outside the pelican. For a moment he thought it was Alex but then his saw the human sprawled on the metal floor fast asleep. That immediately put him on edge causing him to grasp the hilt of his energy sword tightly. He decided to wake his friend so that they could arm themselves and hopefully be more prepared for what was to come.

Alex armed himself with his magnum and a sniper rifle that had been in one of the weapon crates. Vykan opted to stick with his sword and picked up a magnum himself. Alex jumped onto the roof of the pelican and began searching the forest with the sniper scope hoping to spot the thing responsible for the screaming.

"Hey V that screaming sounds just a little to human if you ask me did you notice to?" he asked.

"I had taken note of that." he replied in a serious voice. He stood in front of the pelican facing in the direction the screaming was coming from. The hilt of his energy sword clutched in his right hand and the magnum sitting awkwardly in his left. The two fingers and his two thumbs wrapped around the grip in an odd way. Which was rather uncomfortable for him,but he would manage at least until the danger passed.

The two sat in tense silence until they saw an absolutely massive man walking out of the trees. He was cursing wildly into the air and stomping towards their small crater. Then he spotted them as well they stared each other down. The man glancing rapidly between the two standing before him. His glare grew more intense by the second. His anger boiled over when he practically roared. "You two must be the ones who took it. Give it to me or you're both as good as dead."

The two friends stared him down preparing for a fight they didn't even want a part of. The man's attire was odd he appeared to be wearing stereotypical pirate attire the feathered hat and even had a sword at his side. Alex to be honest was trying and failing to contain his laughter at the ridiculous display. The man who was nearly the size of Vykan turned his intense gaze on the struggling man on top of the pelican.

"What are you laughing at kid." The man growled.

Alex was quick to respond. "Oh I'm sorry but your little outfit is just too funny." He then put on his best pirate accent. "So yah scurvy dog what yah be lookin fur." He lost all restraint then and doubled over on the pelican clutching his stomach from laughing so hard.

Both Vykan and the unidentified man stared at him in disbelief for laughing in what they both saw as a very serious situation. The pirate seemed to lose all cool when he charged at the prone form of Alex. With intent to kill he drew his sword. Only for the strange alien creature to stop him in his tracks when his sword suddenly split in two from a glowing blue blade. The point where the blade had been cut now glowing an angry orange.

Vykan held his sword at his side and tried to get the man to surrender. "This is your last chance to stand down now lea…" He was cut off as a powerful fist connected with his skull. He was sent flying back straight into a tree and was nearly knocked unconscious. He slumped to the ground in pain thankful that his shields absorbed the worst of the blow.

Alex looked horrified at what had just happened. The man now had a menacing look on his face as he approached his friend. He quickly picked the sniper up and aimed a shot as quickly as possible. And a loud crack shook his frame and he watched as the bullet tore through the man's shoulder. He spun around faster than Alex could get another shot off and through a jagged looking knife straight at his exposed head. He yelped and ducked to avoid the sharp object.

When he got up he found the large fist heading straight for his face. He was sent hurtling through several trees from the force. He was astounded once again when he felt every impact but no pain whatsoever. He smiled he felt amazing as if energy was coursing through his body. He got up and looked at the surprised face of his assailant. That surprise however quickly turned into uncontrolled rage. "So you ate it! I have searched for that devil fruit for years now only to find that it's been eaten by some kid. Fine I guess I don't have a choice I'll just have to kill you."

Alex couldn't help it he charged forward as well and met the man head on. His fist shot out and he could feel the shock from the blow travel through his opponent's body. He was sent flying into the air and through several trees himself. He left a sizable crater where he struck the ground. He got up dazed but shook himself out of it. The man looked at Alex and ran forward he sent a fierce kick into Alex's abdomen causing him to keel over and clutch his stomach in pain.

" How does it feel haki prevents devil fruit powers from working even if I'm not good at using it I am learning on my own." The man gloated

Alex looked around for option on what he could do. He spotted Vykan's energy sword lying next to a tree and a quick plan began forming in his head. His fist shot up taking advantage of the man's distracted state to send him high into the air. The uppercut did as intended sending him sky high. Alex lunged for his friends sword and grabbed it ready to finish the man as quickly as possible. As the man came down he activated the sword. He had to aim just right for this to work. When the man was close enough his arm shot out in a wide arc and severed the man's head from his shoulders.

He looked at his friend who had lost consciousness some time during the fight. He walked over and heaved him up careful not to agitate the new or old injuries. He reached the pelican and plopped Vykan down on one of the many chairs that lined the back. He himself sat down in one of the chairs and stared down at his hands as if they weren't even his. "Devil fruit powers huh is that what happened to me I ate a fruit and now I can't be hurt?"

He groaned at his aching stomach. And decided he was to tired to think about it right now. But one thing he knew for sure was that things were about to get much more complicated for them.


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's note: I would like to say thank you to anyone who has read this far because honestly the first two chapters could have been better in my opinion. In any case this one will hopefully be better and please review it helps me a lot.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Halo or One Piece.**

"I'm serious Vykan it's not like we have better equipment. And it doesn't help that you keep squirming!" The Sangheili swordsman was currently lying on the floor of the pelican being treated by Alex for his many injuries. There were several deep gashes in his back from the tree. Alex was currently cleaning them by pulling various slivers and chunks of bark out of the tender skin. He just couldn't keep himself from jerking every time the pliers pulled something out. "Ok V this one is going to hurt a lot, but on the bright side it's the last piece as far as I can see."

Vykan tried to reply but a sudden jerk and a sickening squelch silenced what he was going to say. A pained roar followed after the object was pulled out. Alex examined the jagged branch he had just pulled out of his friends back. It was at least several inches long and covered in purple blood. "Jeez dude I can't believe that was stuck in your back." He got no response from the alien. He looked down at him slightly worried. "Hey V you ok." He did get a response this time but it was no more than a pained groan. He sighed and grabbed a small can of biofoam to spray on the wounds. He was about to spray the substance but decided to warn Vykan real quickly before he did so. "Fair warning you might want to brace yourself this stuff tends to hurt." he looked on as his friends fist tightened. Taking that as consent to do it he sprayed the biofoam on all the wounds. Vykan pressed his face against the floor and pounded one of his fists against the floor in an attempt to power through the pain.

Several minutes after applying the substance Vykans body began to relax from the painkillers present in the biofoam. It didn't take long for the elite to fall asleep right there on the floor. Alex looked at the battered form of his friend and decided to take a quick walk outside while the bandages and foam did there job.

As he wandered the small island his thoughts moved to the events that had transpired yesterday. The pirate they had run into had been quite a surprise but now that he thought about it not an entirely unwelcome one. It meant that there was a ship docked somewhere along the shore of the island. There was finally hope that the two could leave this island alive. That though brought up the subject of what he could now do. If he was being honest with himself he was exhilarated by it. At the same time however he couldn't help but feel bad that it was him that got it and not his friend after seeing the deep gashes in his back. Of course he would never have survived a hit like the one Vykan took without it. He had concluded that they would both be dead if he hadn't tasted that stupid fruit but that didn't stop him from feeling guilty.

He also pondered on the capabilities of his newfound power. He had not yet figured out what exactly his power was because it was such a strange sensation. But he knew for a fact that it wasn't simply invulnerability because every time he was hit with any kind of force he felt a strange rush. Kind of like a surge of energy. It made him feel stronger.

His musings were stopped when something caught his eye through the trees. On a whim he decided to investigate. What he found had him grinning from ear to ear. Sitting on a small isolated beach was a small ship with a pirates flag at the top. And from what he could tell it was completely devoid of any inhabitants. It would appear their pirate friend was a loner. He slowly made his way to the ship as to not alert any possible crew members.

He climbed the rope ladder leading onto the main deck. And after seeing no one around he slunk around the ship searching all the rooms for signs of life only to find nothing. Determining that the ship was truly empty had been an easier endeavor than he had assumed it would be. He came to the captain's quarters and tried the handle only to find it locked. Using a little bit of his new found strength he tore the door off its hinges.

He wasn't entirely surprised by what he found but he wasn't really expecting it either. Books were stacked up to the ceiling with a large wooden desk right in the middle and an average sized bed situated in the right corner of the room. On the left wall was a map with hundreds of islands dotting it many scrawled out with black ink. Only one was circled in the same ink. At the bottom of the map was a label proclaiming South Blue most likely the name of the ocean they had found themselves in. He soon lost interest in the map and decided to investigate the stuff situated on the desk.

He found several books describing the subject of haki that he had heard the pirate mention yesterday. And if it could neutralize his new power than that was something He felt he dearly needed to know about. He gathered all of the books on the subject and found one other that interested him. One that contained information on various devil fruits that the pirate had also mentioned. He grabbed that as well because he had a feeling whatever he ate would be in their.

He did a quick raid of the kitchen for food so him and Vykan could eat tonight before leaving the ship and making his way back to the pelican. His friend was still sleeping when he arrived so he sat in the pilot's seat and took out the book on devil fruits. He noticed that there was an abundance of paper Jammed between two pages so he decided to start there. Page after page of notes was stuck between them most of it seemed to be speculation on what the fruit was capable of. He placed those aside and looked at the pages beneath. He found a picture depicting exactly what he had found behind the wall.

It was labeled the Doteki Doteki no mi. He decided to read what was known about it. It read "This devil fruit is one that gives the user the ability to absorb and manipulate kinetic energy. Like all devil fruit in exchange for this power the user loses their ability to swim. It is also known that haki and seastone upon contact prevent these abilities from manifesting. It has also been confirmed that this fruit also makes the user immune to physical blows. That is the extent of what we know about this devil fruit. As of this point it's location is unknown."

Well… that was a lot to take in if he could control kinetic energy that opened a world of possibilities. What he really didn't like was that water was his greatest weakness now if this book was right. Being on a planet that was primarily ocean posed some issues if it was true. He would rather not risk finding out but if he wanted to know if that actually was true he would need to test it. And he would rather it be in a controlled environment rather than in the middle of a fight where he would run the risk of not being saved. He would have to ask Vykan for help in that regard but he would have to wait until he recovered.

And so he continued like this for several days. Reading up on the unfamiliar planet while his friend slept. On occasion he would check up on Vykan and wake him for meals. He read extensively about the Marines and world government. As well as a great deal about what was called haki. He must say that it seemed like a particularly good skill to learn especially for Vykan since he had no means to defend himself from even some of the weaker pirates. He could rely on his new powers for now but his friend didn't have that luxury. On peaceful days he would leave the pelican to pick up some more books to entertain himself,and had even begun experimenting with his powers when he had finally convinced himself that he wouldn't kill himself jumping out of the massive trees.

Progress was slow but he was learning about the world around him as well as himself. Several more weeks had passed by before Vykan had made a complete recovery. Alex had demonstrated his new found power to his friend and that had kick started a long and arduous questioning. He first explained his abilities so far and what he could do. Alex then proceeded to explain a great deal about this planet from haki and devil fruits to the world government and pirates. "Ok V now that you know all of this I wanted to ask you about how we should proceed."

Vykan thought about the question for a good ten minutes before answering. "I believe we should find the Marines of this world perhaps they could aid us in returning to our ship and if not at least offer us refuge for the time being." Alex nodded at the sound logic pleased that they had both come to the same conclusion.

Alex then looked around nervously in thought trying to determine how he should break some troubling news to his friend. "Ok Vykan this may sound a bit weird but you need to listen to me." Alex stated carefully.

Vykan looked at Alex in mild surprise he knew his friend only ever called him by his real name when something serious had come up. He sat up a little straighter so that he could listen to what Alex had to say. "Go on."

Reassured Alex began. "Ok so essentially water may be a nightmare for me now supposedly eating that fruit gave me my powers but at the cost that water will drain all of my energy. As a result devil fruit users like me can't swim at least according to this book." He said holding up the mentioned text. "This could be a big issue because like 90% of this planet is oceans."

Vykan thought on it for a second seeing the big issue presented in that simple fact. It took a moment but what his friend was asking eventually clicked. "You want to test it don't you? In that pond near here.?"A nod from Alex confirmed his worries. " You realize that this little test of yours is just a disaster waiting to happen if what you tell me is true."

"Yeah I know that pond is easily big and deep enough for me to drown, and that's why you're going to save my ass if I don't come back up after a couple of seconds." Alex replied

A reluctant sigh escaped from Vykan's jaws. "Fine lead the way." a grin made its way onto Alex's face as he lead his friend to the large pond."

They arrived at the pond after a short walk Alex took the remains of his armor off so it wouldn't drag him down. After he had made sure everything was in order he looked at the water in trepidation. He wasn't so sure of himself now that he actually stood before the water. Thoughts of what could go wrong flashed in his mind constantly images of sinking helpless to save himself. He tried to shake the thoughts from his mind but they persisted nonetheless. What if Vykan didn't react in time. What if he got caught on something as he if what if what if. He could not bring himself to stop these intrusive thoughts.

A sudden push on his back stopped all of his thoughts however. As he fell towards the murky water he took a deep breath before he sank in. The water surrounded him soaking through his clothes' and draining any energy at all from his body. His body went limp as he began drifting downward terrified that he would drown. He looked up at the sunlight shining through the murky depths. He drifted downwards plants beginning to brush against his skin as he grew closer to the bottom. His lungs began to burn in protest as he held his breathe finally he couldn't hold it anymore and he lost consciousness.

Vykan hauled his unresponsive companion out of the water and tossed him onto the shore. He rushed out of the pond soon after cursing his own stupidity for pushing his friend in. Fortunately he seemed to have saved his friend on time because Alex started hacking violently to expel the fluid from his lungs. He continued this for several minutes puking up volumes of water onto the dry ground. Now on his hands and knees he coughing died down and became a steady yet panicked breathing. When he was sure his friend wasn't in danger of death Vykan collapsed in relief onto the hard ground. Alex's breathing calmed down considerably but was still rather struggled. But he got off a few words. "You're a dick"Another rasped breath followed before he continued. "you know that?"

Vykan laughed at the words as he lay on the shore. in response he said. "If you hadn't lost your nerve perhaps I wouldn't have felt inclined to do it." To which he only got an annoyed "shut up". Vykan let Alex recover a little more before helping him to his feet and making the slow calm walk back to the pelican. Alex practically collapsed into the don't seat so he could rest for a whole before they discussed their departure from this island.

Vykan for the hours Alex slept busied himself by packing away and making a list of all their weapons and ammunition. So far he had packed several magnums a needler and a storm rifle into the crate. A saw was the next to be listed and organized into the container. He set aside their personal weapons aside so they could carry them themselves. Alex's Sniper rifle and magnum his energy sword and carbine all sat in the copilot seat. Next he started scrounging the pelican for additional supplies be it weapons ammo or medical supplies. He tore open several compartments that had gotten stuck shut from the crash. He found quite a bit of additional sniper ammo that he was sure Alex would appreciate. In one of the storage compartments he found a large device that he immediately recognized. It was a device meant for recharging the sangheili's plasma weaponry. It was a pain in the ass to pry out of the bent storage unit but it would be worth it if the machine was intact. Before he packed the charger away he checked that the power core was still intact, and indeed it was in fact if he used it sparingly he could extend the life on his sword by 2 maybe 3 years of course that's only if they couldn't find the Infinity.

He went over the charger several times checking for faults or damage before giving it his seal of approval and carefully placing it into the crate. He didn't find much else the last thing he found was a shotgun along with a few shells for it. Which he placed in with their other supplies before packing away the biofoam and first aid kits. His job done he decided to wake Alex and ask what his plan was.

Alex roused slowly as Vykan shook him awake. He groggily sat up from his slumped position and looked at his friend with tired eyes. He frowned from being woken and asked in a rather bitter mood. "What do you want?"

Vykan asked what the plan was for escaping the island and also went through the process of showing Alex the crate he had packed. Alex was impressed that his friend had managed to sort and mark down all their supplies on a small notepad he had found. "This is pretty impressive how long did this take you."

"A few hours while you were sleeping I didn't have anything else to do so I figured I'd get our stuff ready to take to the ship you found." he replied.

Alex nodded and thought for a moment. "Ok so that pirate ship still has a lot of supplies on it probably another month's worth of food for the both of us. Though we should still try and reach an inhabited island as soon as possible because I don't know how much longer the food will last. After that we should head for a marine base and ask for help if we can." Vykan nodded and pointed to the crate of supplies.

"Will we be leaving tonight or in the morning, and can you carry that my back still isn't completely recovered."

Alex nonchalantly walked over and lifted the massive container over his head as if it didn't weigh several hundred pounds. "Yeah I think I can carry this to the ship. As for your first question we should leave in the morning but there are beds on the ship so we should sleep there for tonight."

With that out of the way the two began their slow walk to reach the ship. When they did reach it Alex decided to show off his new strength a little more by rodding the box up onto the deck with ease. For which Vykan looked at him in exasperation. "Show off."

A pleased grin took its place on his face as he replied. "You're just jealous that I have super powers now." Some annoyed grumbling could be heard from behind him as Alex climbed the rope ladder onto the ship. When Vykan was up with him he led his friend down to the crew's quarters were they would sleep for the night. After a quick good night the two were out cold on the comfortable cots.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's note: Ok everyone this chapter is going to shift away from Alex and Vykan and focus on the crew of the infinity. I will be doing these kinds of chapters once in awhile at least until Alex and Vykan are reunited with the Infinity. Please tell me what you think I have had a disappointing lack of reviews. It's more than a little annoying that so many people read but so few care to tell me what they think. So if you have the time I would love to hear your thoughts.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Halo or One Piece.**

The base of operation Laskey now stood in had taken several weeks to set up mainly because all the material had to be salvaged from the bottom of the ocean. The small island they had landed on was abundant with various fruits and animals to feed everyone in the base. The Infinity had crash landed several miles offshore and had quickly sunk to the bottom of the ocean. For the first weeks they had been limited to tents because the salvage teams couldn't get past the massive snake like creatures that called the depths home.

Progress was slow but they had managed to drive away the local wildlife and recovery began in earnest. Though they did have to set up mines around the island to keep the beasts from returning. They had tried to several times but had quickly learned to avoid the island all together. Due to this delay construction of Alpha base had been delayed until last week. Now though there was enough housing for most of the crew and a small command center in the middle. But that was the extent of their new home so far.

Laskey looked out the window of the command center at the expanse of forest that they had called home for the past few weeks. Roland had easily determined that The Infinity would never be able to fly again once the salvage team had reported its condition. It had been split in half by the impact and the parts that had been functional were crushed by the water pressure. He and The Arbiter had determined their best course of action for now was to scout out the planet and build up resources until they can construct a new ship. Which was why they were building a home here because it took years to build a ship like The Infinity and that was only if they had professionals with them as it stands now they only had people trained to maintain and repair a ship not build one from scratch. Halsey was the only one who had any knowledge on the subject.

Which brought him to the Spartans. They had been running recon missions since arrival so far they had catalogued about 50 islands and the resources found on them. About half of them had been found by Blue Team. Who seemed to keep themselves away from him if at all possible. The only time they stayed on the base was to rest for several hours at a time before departing on a new mission. That was a bit worrying for the captain he knew the cause was his conversation with chief before the crash. They were doing good work though so he wouldn't push them until it became an issue. They had even found a small gold deposit on one of the islands.

He was brought from his thoughts as a pelican returned from its scouting mission. If he remembered correctly that was Osiris' pelican. He decided to meet them on the small landing pad they had set up so that they could go over the findings. The walk from the command center to the landing pad was uneventful. What he found on the landing pad though was wholly unexpected. Buck was being wheeled off by some of their medical personnel gory gouges had been torn into his armor that wasn't the only strange thing on the pad however. Tanaka was dragging the corpse of a humanoid creature from the hatch in the pelican. It had webbed hands and in its open jaws jagged teeth could be seen it had gills on its neck and a large fin on its back. His gaze moved from the creature onto Locke searching for an explanation. Locke took off his helmet and struck a quick salute before he explained the current situation. "Sir the island we found had inhabitants we managed to avoid most of them but a run in with some strange flora had this one stumble upon us." he said nodding at the creature that laid dead at his feet.

"So what happened to Buck?" Laskey asked.

"He was attacked because this thing said we were trespassing. It bit into Buck's arm before we killed it which is why he's being taken to the infirmary."

"This thing managed to bite through titanium armor?" Laskey asked incredulously.

"No its teeth didn't pierce the armor but the bite did cave it in enough that the armor buried itself into his skin. It's cutting off circulation in his arm which is why we had to rush here before we could finish cataloging the island."

"That's still astonishing that kind of jaw strength is unheard of."

"We planned to drop it off at halsey's lab so she could research it make us more familiar of what we'll be dealing with on this planet."

"That's a sound plan." Laskey nodded.

With that Locke walked towards the command center dragging the body behind him. Laskey turned to the remaining members of Osiris. Vale was carrying out a small glass box containing what appeared to be a fruit of some kind. It was round with a greyish color with odd swirling patterns all over it. Laskey raised an eyebrow at them wondering why the fruit warranted containment in a box meant for hazardous material. Vale picked up on his questioning look when she turned towards him. " Locke failed to mention that the reason Buck was caught off guard by that thing is because we had gotten into a pretty heated debate on what to do with this fruit."

Laskey still confused decided to ask a question. "Ok yes but what would cause you to put it into that case how dangerous could it be?"

"Honestly we put it in here because we didn't know the answer to that it emits an extremely weak radioactive signature that our sensors barely managed to pick up. On top of that the signature is entirely unfamiliar to our database as far as we can tell. So we locked it in here just in case it was dangerous somehow. We wanted to bring it here and have it analysed by halsey or at least someone with knowledge in botany because it seems like Halsey will be busy with that creature for awhile."

Laskey contemplated that statement for a moment before replying. "I do have someone that is studied plants for a while but she's been out of commission since the crash."

"Was she injured during the evacuation?" Tanaka asked walking up and joining the conversation.

Laskey turned to her to acknowledge the question. "No but the only family she had left never made it off the Infinity. You have to understand that she is a medical officer so it hit her hard when he died she has been unable to do any effective work since. I had to relieve her of duty because she was only serving to make the many injuries worse. She's had several weeks to recover since then though so she may be able to help even if barely."

"If that's the case then I think that you should take this to her." Vale said handing the box over to Laskey. "I'm pretty sure a Spartan showing up outside her door would only make her feel worse." Laskey nodded and took the box from her hand before thanking them.

He looked at the fruit in the container contemplating if pushing her from her room was a good idea or not. He stopped thinking along those lines and shrugged his shoulders. Madison Newman had locked herself in her room for a month now he was sure this would be good for her they needed one of there head medics back.

She sat hugging the picture frame to her chest lifting it up once in awhile to look at its content. It was a picture of her and her little brother standing in front of a training building he had just finished all the preparation to become an ODST His arm was slung over her shoulder with an overjoyed grin on his face. He wore a brand new set of black armor with the helmet strapped to his hip. She wore her white medical uniform and she remembered being so happy for him following in their father's footsteps. When she found out which ship he would be stationed on she had had a friend of hers pull some strings so she could be placed on the same ship so she could watch over him. Alex had been the only family she had left after their parents died.

She felt tears welling up in her eyes as she reminisced on the past, and remembered that all her work to make sure he was happy and safe was all for naught now. She set the picture aside and curled up on the bed that had become her only comfort for the long weeks on the island. She heard a knock on the door and practically jumped up off the bed she tried her best to wipe the tears from her eyes before answering the door. She found the captain standing outside the door and did her best to appear better than she actually was.

When Laskey saw the pathetic attempt to appear strong in front of him he felt sorry for the woman. She stood up straight when she saw him and gave a weak smile. But he could easily see through the ruse her face was flushed bright red around the eyes and streaks of tears stained her cheeks. In a high and shaky voice she greeted him. " G...Good morning Captain what can I do for you." he returned her greeting and cautiously asked her if he could come in. She eventually nodded for him to come in but it seemed fairly forced to him. He looked around the small room trying to ignore the distressed air it had to it. Yet the stuff scattered along the floor just wouldn't let him. Clothing and various personal objects were strewn everywhere. The picture on the bed also caught his attention but he didn't comment for her sake.

He pulled a chair over from one of the corners and sat down in front of her as she tried her best to look like she was perfectly fine. The way she slumped hopelessly onto the bed though told a very different story. He sighed and decided to bring her back into the outside world as slowly as need be. "Maddie" he began. She looked up at the sound of his voice. "I know you are still hurting but we need you you're one of our best doctors here. I've decided that you need to come back out of this room, but to help you cope I've set up a small research project for you. This way you can bring your colleagues back into your life at your own pace. Have them help you right away if you wish but you can also slowly reintegrate yourself into your work through this if you so please." He placed his hand on her shoulder in a reassuring gesture. "Your assignment will be in lab 2 so please consider it if you aren't ready to come out yet then I understand but please at least consider." He seemed lost on what to say next but opted to get up and leave her to her own devices. As the door shut behind him she loosened up considerably slumping into the bed and staring at her feet with a lost expression. It took her a long time but she managed to calm down enough that she could get out of her room without feeling exposed.

She made her way into the command center waving as she passed by familiar faces. Lab 2 was a rather large room for her to be working alone in. Hopefully she could bring herself to talk with some of her friends eventually. She walked over to the desk and looked at the container sitting on the counter. She read over a report on the small grey fruit sitting on the counter. Apparently it gave off a very weak radioactive signature which would make studying it a little more difficult. Her job was to determine if it was dangerous or not. She sighed and walked over to a closet to grab a hazmat suit in case it was dangerous.

She slipped the white suit over her normal clothes, and walked back over to the fruit with a purpose she carefully removed it from it's container and placed it on the counter near several instruments meant to measure for the energy the plant supposedly gave off it did detect the energy the fruit was giving off but it was nowhere near dangerous levels. Still better safe than sorry. She briefly considered how to proceed making a quick decision she grabbed a scalpel and cut into the soft flesh of the fruit. She jumped when the detector went crazy and displayed energy much higher than the fruit was giving off before. She looked back down at the fruit and could see a bit of the juice from inside leaking from the incision. That was alarming whatever was causing the energy was much stronger within the fruit than on the outside.

She quickly placed the scalpel down and walked over to grab a small syringe to put some of the juice in. She extracted a small amount before placing it in a test tube so a machine could analyze the substance throughout the day. After that she placed the fruit back in the container to make sure no one was tempted by it. The rest of her day she spent speaking to Laskey about having a guard posted at the door to make sure no one walked into the contaminated room. After this chat with the captain her day was like any other before the crash spent chatting a bit reluctantly with other colleagues. The work had offered her a brief distraction from Alex's demise but the rest of the day didn't offer the same comfort her thoughts constantly drifted to her brother she had to venture back to her room several times to calm herself down. For this reason she was glad when the alarm on her watch went off signalling that the machine should be finished analyzing the substance. She would take anything if it kept the pain at bay.

She passed the guard and greeted him politely before making her way into the lab. She put on a hazmat suit for the 2nd time that day and was pleased to find the results of her scan of the juice. She was however significantly less pleased with the results of the scan. It came up with nothing out of the ordinary for a fruit standard chemical recipes and other stuff typically found in fruit. The only thing mildly useful was that it said that their was a minute amount of a foreign energy within the fruit. Of course most of this she had already determined during her earlier assessment of the fruit. She sat back in a chair and tried to run her hand through her black hair only for her hand to stop short when it hit the suit over head. She scowled at that and thought about what to do next. She settled with seeing how a bacteria would react if they were introduced to the juice. So that's just what she did she put the juice in a petri dish under a microscope and then introduced the bacteria. And was further disappointed when the bacteria showed absolutely no reaction to the juice. Continuing along this line of thinking she tested every possible way to elicit a reaction.

Day after day she tried to get something to happen engrossing herself in her work but nothing ever happened it always ended the same no matter what kind of bacteria she used to test it. Eventually after several more hours on her fifth day she slumped into her chair defeated. Nothing worked the organisms she tested it on always remained completely unharmed. In the end as she wrote up a report on her research she concluded that the fruit was harmless despite the energy it emitted. She took off the head part of the suit and ran her hand through her hair relieved to have it off. She sniffed the air and looked at the fruit sitting on the counter. It smelled fairly good and there was no evidence to support that it was dangerous. She took off her gloves and cut a small wedge off the fruit. The inside resembled that of a peach but the skin certainly didn't. She cautiously prodded the innards of the fruit and rubbed a bit of the juice between the tips of her thumb and index finger. The small wedge in her hand did look fairly familiar like a slice of peach and it certainly didn't smell bad. She decide that it couldn't really hurt her and took a cautious bite. It didn't taste bad in her mouth as she chewed several times. She swallowed the small chunk unsatisfied with the bland flavor.

She immediately became alarmed however when the sensor that monitored the fruits energy output stopped the obnoxious beeping that it did whenever the fruit was out of the container. She stumbled towards it to see what had happened but was nervous when it showed that there wasn't even a trace of the energy left. It was like it had just vanished. She suddenly started feeling itchy all over especially on her forehead she scratched at it vigorously but hit something slimy and yelped when it hurt to touch it. She ran over to a mirror to see what had happened what she saw was that her eyes had gone completely black and additional eyes had grown out on her forehead. She screamed and fell back at the sight in front of her. She felt her stomach begin to tingle as well and soon after 2 sets of black insect like legs tore through the suit she still wore. Behind her the black abdomen of a spider had grow just above her legs a very clear red hourglass symbol on it. That became too much for her to handle and she passed out.

The marine that was guarding the lab rushed through the door as soon as he heard the panicked scream. His weapon was raised ready for anything to jump out. We'll maybe not everything because what he found practically had him screaming and running. On the floor lied the unconscious form of a creature the the likes of which he had never seen before. It appeared to be some disgusting hybrid of spider and human 8 eyes on its head its fingernails ending in sharp points,and 4 obvious legs spread out from its stomach the abdomen quivered each time it breathed in. Other than those features it looked human. He couldn't stand looking at it any longer and ran out the door to find halsey and the captain they needed to hear this.

Captain Laskey was currently discussing Halsey's findings on the fish like creature in the upper level of the command center. But that was easily blown away from his attention when a marine charged in panting madly trying to catch his breath. He stuttered several times trying to get his point across. " Just calm down what happened." Laskey said trying to calm the panicked man.

The marine collected himself before telling them the news. "There's...there's some "THING" in lab 2." he finally managed to blurt out. He looked at the man dearly hoping this wasn't some joke.

He looked to one of the other people in the room and asked them to bring up the security feed for lab 2. Laskey waited patiently for the footage to come up when it did it showed a normal lab. Aside from one big difference in one of the corners sat a strange creature curled into a ball its knees clutched to its by its arms and 4 other insect like legs. He looked to Dr. Halsey to confirm what he was seeing and only received the same astonished face that he was sure he had plastered onto himself. He asked the worker to rewind the footage to see if they could figure out what happened. They stopped about a half an hour before the marine reported he heard the scream and watched on from there.

It was uneventful at first Maddie Newman was going about her research and writing what appeared to be a thorough report on her findings of the fruit. They watched her take off the headpiece of the hazmat suit 15 minutes before the scream. She continued studying the fruit cutting a small wedge out to examine. Eventually to their surprise she took a cautious bite from the small wedge and swallow it after a few seconds. She then took on an alarmed expression and stumbled back over to the workstation and began looking at the scanner they had provided her. She began scratching madly at her forehead before turning back towards the camera and to the mirror on the left side of the room. They could see the 6 additional eyes that had appeared on her forehead. When she saw them she screamed and fell backwards she sat there wide eyed staring out the mirror as the other changes took place before passing out. Then the soldier that brought this to their attention ran in.

Laskey was lost on what to do sudden violent mutations weren't something you dealt with everyday after all. He turned to Halsey "I need to go down and talk to her." he stated Halsey looked at him dumbfounded.

"You can't be serious she's probably dangerous or even worse she might be contagious."She practically yelled. Laskey sent her an intense glare that dared her to say something like that again.

"Halsey look at her does she look like she would willingly. She's been mourning her brothers death for a month now and then this happens she going to have a breakdown." he paused to calm himself before continuing. "Look I'll put on a hazard suit and bring my magnum with me just in case and i'll even lock her in there until we know she isn't dangerous but I definitely won't allow you or anyone working with you treating her as an experiment." Halsey was about to protest but was cut off by the Captain "don't even try to tell me that isn't exactly what you were going to do I could see it in your eyes." She slunk off at that muttering to herself all the way.

She didn't know what to do she was a monster now that fruit did this to her. She was curled up in a corner trying and failing to not panic. What would she do what would everyone think of her. No they would come they most likely turn her into some experiment or just straight kill her. Tears were now leaking from her main eyes. What would Alex think of her if he had seen her like this. That thought was the end for her she broke down and collapsed onto the floor. She heard the door click open then shut and her head snapped up to see who had entered the room.

It was the captain he was decked out in a full hazmat suit. With a magnum nervously rested in his right hand. She involuntarily let out an inhuman hiss when she saw the weapon. Her clawed hands shot up to cover her mouth shocked at what she had just did. Luckily he seemed to understand why she reacted badly and set the magnum on a counter and put his hands up in a placating manner. Then he spoke. "Maddison is that you?" she looked at him and nodded carefully. "Ok can you tell me what happened?" he pressed gently.

She looked over at the counter where the fruit and her report sat undamaged. Her voice was shaky from the stress of what was happening but she answered. "I...I was filling out my report on the fruit I had done everything tested it in every way I could think of. So I decided it was safe because it had never hurt anything I tested it on. I took my headpiece off because I had come to that conclusion. The fruit didn't smell bad and I had already determined that it wasn't dangerous so I tasted it. But as soon as I swallowed the sensor stopped detecting any energy from the fruit. And then...then" she looked down at herself. "Well this. I was wrong so so wrong." she said covering her many eyes as tears streamed down her cheeks. Laskey walked over to the fruit picked it up and put it into the containment box.

"I won't pretend to understand what this is like." he said as he stood in front of the door out. He turned to her and tried to look her in the eye without cringing at the site. "But you have my word that we will do everything we can to help you, However until we do understand you'll have to stay in here for safety." She nodded at his soothing words before watching him leave.

Laskey breathed a sigh of relief as he exited the small room. He tried not to show it in front of her but her appearance was extremely unnerving. He spotted Halsey and several others waiting for him outside. He straightened up and looked at a scientist to his right and handed the container off to the man. "Put that under quarantine as soon as possible." he watched that man run off before turning to Halsey. "That is still Maddison behind that appearance she is perfectly aware of the circumstances and as she is a part of my crew I will not tolerate you or any of your team hurting her. But I want you to study her find out why this happened and maybe fix it." She nodded sourly to the captain and walked off down the hallway. He suddenly remembered something and yelled out for her to stop. She turned to him unpleased obviously. "I need you to put the energy signature of that fruit into our database and have our scout teams start actively scanning for similar signatures. If more are found I want them brought here and Quarantined just like the other one." That done the two parted ways and made to do their own business.


	5. Chapter 5

**Important Please read**

 **Author's note: Alright back to Alex an Vykan for this chapter This'll be their first interactions with people from the One Piece world. I am going to have 7 of my own devil fruits within this story 4 of them i already know who they are going to 2 of which you've already seen but 3 of them are undecided as of yet if anyone wants to give me feedback on who should get them please do so whether it be pre existing characters or if you would like me to create new ones. Anyway please comment and on with the show. And if anyone wants to be a beta for me it would be much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Halo or One Piece.**

Alex concentrated intensely focusing all his will into controlling his new found power. He slowly reached out for the door knob hoping to be successful. He practically jumped out of his skin when Vykan yelled at him from where he was hiding behind several crates. "Just do it already get it over with." Alex bit his tongue to keep from yelling back, and as a result losing focus. He again reached for the door before carefully grasping the knob and turning slowly. He mentally prepared himself for what happened with several other doors on the ship. He began to celebrate that he had finally managed to control it. But the moment he lost focus he felt a small amount of energy he had stored travel into the door. A split second after the feeling passed the door exploded violently and showered the outside deck with tiny wooden fragments. The only thing of the door remaining intact was the small bronze knob in his hand.

Vykan walked up behind him and decided to add his two cents into the events that had just transpired. "I am beginning to question if you even can control it." Alex stared at the many shattered walls and doors of the ship. As well as the craters that now littered the once pristine deck. All because he had forced Vykan to shoot him with one of the cannons on the ship. It hadn't hurt at all like he had expected but now he seemed to have an excess of energy that just came out whenever it damn well pleased. And he couldn't even tell if it was about to happen and stop it, NO it just happened he would be having a drink and the glass would suddenly explode he'd be eating lunch and his chair would shoot out from under him and through a wall or two. He would take a step and the wood under his feet would become a smoking crater. A scowl took its place on his features ashe glared hatefully down at the door knob in his hands. He cursed under his breathe before hurling the offending object with all his might at the ground. He felt the same release as energy traveled into the knob and instead of bouncing off the battered deck it shot straight through it leaving a smoking hole.

Vykan sighed and rubbed the top of his head as he went to go make sure the knob didn't put a hole into the bottom of the ship. Alex watched his friend disappear into the depths of the ship with a look of irritation written all over his features. These powers were starting to become a pain in the ass more than even remotely useful. He sighed and scratched his arm feeling somewhat odd without his armor that had been with him for years now. It didn't really serve any purpose anymore. He walked up to the helm of the ship and looked at the map he had ripped from that room. They didn't have all that much further to travel if what his compass and the map where telling him was correct. He almost reached for the wheel to adjust their course a bit, but stopped himself before he broke that to. He sat on a bench and contemplated what to do he couldn't exactly help much it would only make things worse if he checked his weapons like he so desperately wanted to they would probably just end up as piles of misshapen metal. He was growing restless the last couple days had only made him feel worthless. Vykan had to do absolutely everything because he just wouldn't let Alex do anything anymore. He'd let him try things once in awhile like what they had just tried with the door. Of course it never worked in his favor.

Hell at this point if he absorbed to much energy he could be considered a living WMD. So he just sat there being careful not to let any energy out. He saw Vykan walk by several times carrying wooden boards of various sizes in his left arm and an old hammer in his right. He honestly felt really bad about all the work he had caused for his only companion but it wasn't like he could do anything about it. In the end he just closed his eyes and rested peacefully on the bench waiting for their arrival on the island.

Vykan walked back up to the deck from the interior of the ship examining the new scrapes on his hands. He wasn't meant for the labor that his friend was causing him. His kind was built to be warriors not craftsmen. He shook himself from that line of thinking and went to check the ship's course just to be sure they were on the right track. So they continued on like that for several more hours Alex sleeping peacefully on the bench and Vykan steering the ship in peace that he rarely had with Alex around. Eventually Vykan could make out an outline on the horizon that vaguely resembled an island. He decided to wait a little longer to wake Alex so he could rest he already had a hard enough time taming his new abilities he didn't want to add anymore stress to his life if at all possible.

Once he could make out the trees on the island he wandered over to his friend and shook him awake. The two took their time at that point feeling no rush to get anywhere anytime soon. They savored their lunch and laid anchor in the harbor of a surprisingly large city. It was bustling with activity people going about their daily business. Exchanging happy greetings with each other and being peaceful people. They didn't give much notice to the battered ship that pulled up to the docks. Likely because Alex had the insight to tear down the pirate flag atop the mast. The two sat down to discuss a strategy as to how they were going to do this they knew Vykan would likely stand out like a sore thumb and if he made his way into the city without a disguise or a cloak they would be targeted by whoever governed the area. They would need to introduce him to government officials slowly to get them used to the idea of Vykan not being some monster. Of course that may be more difficult than anticipated nonetheless they had to have some kind of connection with the people of this world to even stand a shadow of a chance of finding the Infinity and her crew. And so the two decided that they would have Alex would be their representative while Vykan followed him invisible.

The two made their way off their ship and onto the docks Alex trying desperately to contain his power to keep from drawing to much attention to himself. He had a sword strapped to his hip to appear dangerous not that he could actually use it. He also wore a black button up shirt and a pair of old jeans he had found on the ship. Overall the image seemed to do the trick keeping too much attention away from him he actually seemed to fit in. if only a little. He went about the town asking people around different areas where he should go if he needed help with anything. Some of them pointed him to a castle in the center of the city that they said was were there king lived, and some pointed him to a small marine base on the outskirts of the city and told him to talk to the navy lieutenant. After some time trying to decide which would be the better option he opted to head for the castle because many people had pointed out that the king was much more tolerant of people than the marines were. Despite the fact that the marines would be much more helpful towards their ultimate goal he felt introducing Vykan to them would be a bit of a mistake for the moment based on what. He also took the time to learn a bit about the king and the kingdom he presided over. The kingdom was called Sairia and the king was to only be referred to by citizens as Lord Cyrus or Your Majesty. So with that bit of intelligence gathering done he made his way to the front gate of the castle. Surprisingly the gate was already open fortunately for him. In any case he shrugged off the mild shock and strutted confidently up to the front door where some guards were positioned.

That action provoked a small questioning before they took his sword and escorted him through the main hall to a rather ornate throne room. In the throne sat an aging man probably in his fifties who looked at him quizzically when he was escorted his right stood a man around the same age as Alex who looked down at him with a sneer. Most likely the king's son if he had to guess just based on the way he was dressed. To his left sat a woman wearing a long flowing pink dress that hugged her form. She too was about the same age as him possibly a bit younger early 20's most likely he had to assume this was the princess people seemed to mention fairly often whenever he asked about the king. He was snapped out of his stupor when the snob that stood to the right of the king addressed him. "You should learn your place peasant you're in the presence of royalty! Now Bow!" As much as he didn't want to listen to this asshole Alex knew it was the right thing to do if he wanted their cooperation.

But just as he began to do so the king snapped at his son. "We don't address my subjects with that attitude they may deserve more respect than you at this point!" Annoyance was clear on the prince's face as he stalked off grumbling about how he demanded more respect than that. Then the king turned to him and asked. "Now kid what did you need?"

Alex thought on his answer for a moment before replying. "Me and a friend recently arrived here after being attacked by pirates our ship is badly damaged and we need to find some friends who may or may not be on this island." he was pleased by his explanation but quickly added afterwards. "Your Majesty." The king looked at him for a moment before smiling and turning to the princess.

"Nalia can you ask the guards to compile a list of people who recently arrived on the island." She nodded sweetly before walking off to do as requested. The king then turned back to Alex "If any of your friends are on this island than they will be on that list. As for your ship I will need some form of payment to repair it."

Alex bit the inside of his cheek realizing that they didn't have any money on them. "I'm afraid we don't have any money to give to repay you the pirates took everything from us. You must understand." The king frowned slightly at that remark before glancing around the room before his eyes suddenly settled upon the guards standing behind Alex. his eyes lit up as a proposal formed in his mind.

"Do you have combat experience if so then I believe I may have a way for you to repay me." Alex glanced back at the sword and almost winced he did have combat experience but all of that would be useless until he learned to control his new powers. They would have to do for now. He nodded at the ruler who smiled at the answer before motioning for him to accompany him somewhere. The two made their way through the labyrinth of hallways that made up the castle they traveled down and ever deeper into the castle. Eventually they reached what Alex could only assume was some kind of vault if the heavy metal doors and thick lock where anything to go by. So as the king entered a code into the old combination lock Alex watched carefully preparing himself for what lied behind the doors. What lied inside however was anticlimactic considering the imposing entry way there was a variety of weapons scattered throughout the room on racks even on the floor. But the king led him to a locked chest inside the room before unlocking it and showing him the empty container.

"This used to contain to devil fruit of amazing value that we intended to hand over to the world government in order to maintain our treaty with them." He began "Unfortunately several days before they were set to be transported someone broke in and stole both we know for a fact the intruder ate one of them because shortly after the robbery a large reptilian beast began terrorizing my city. As of yet we have been unable to determine who the culprit is because they have always remained in their beast state while royal guard or marines were in pursuit."

Alex looked up at the king and asked a question he strongly felt he would grow to regret. "What exactly do you want me to do." The king smiled and replied.

"I simply want you to aid in our hunt of the culprit. I'm going to send for Lieutenant One-eye and have him meet us in the courtyard so we can continue with our next hunt when night falls" Alex could only think about one thing at that point and that was what the hell had he gotten himself into.

Of course of course the marine lieutenant would be some stuck up bastard who thinks he could do EVERYTHING on his own. He bored a hole into Alex's brain from the intensity of his gaze. The glare might actually have been intimidating if it weren't for the fancy fake eye that would look everywhere but at what the lieutenant wanted it to. He would have laughed at the strange site if he didn't know the man had the authority to arrest him. That and the massive machete that hung at his hip was more than a bit intimidating.

No Alex didn't want to push his luck anymore it looked like the man was already considering cutting him down that very second. So after a few seconds of hostile glares the man spoke up looking at the king. "You really want me to take this piece of trash with me it's bad enough you want us to bring your pathetic guards with us." he growled out. Alex set aside the sudden urge to punch the moron by reminding himself that they needed this if they were ever going to get back to the Infinity. The Kings retort for the man was quick and precise.

"I will stop you right there lieutenant as you well know You are only allowed in my kingdom as long as I say so I could have you hauled onto a ship and taken to your superiors to report of your failures." The smug look Alex was failing to contain didn't go unnoticed by the marine. His glare focused on both the king and Alex for several very long minutes before he finally relented.

"Fine! I'll take the little shithead with me but know that if he dies I will not be the one responsible. His blood will be on your hands." With that said the man stormed off and motioned for all the men Alex included to follow him. Alex nodded to the king in thanks before following after the large group of soldiers.

The group headed into the forests surrounding the city in order to search for the thief night had fallen shortly after the hunting party had left the castle. In order to cover more ground they had split up into several groups of four. His group consisted three low ranking marines and himself. He had been asking them various questions about the case and what they had found out so far. None of them seemed very knowledgable about it all he could really get out of them was that the thief was some type of lizard zoan user and apparently were fairly good at stealth and close quarters combat. That wasn't a very good sign because his group at least seemed undertrained. He doubted they even knew how to hold their swords properly. Of course he wasn't one to judge it's not like he had any knowledge of how to use a sword either. He could gut someone in seconds with a good combat knife but a sword was a completely different story.

He looked up at the unfamiliar night sky silently reminiscing while they proceeded. forward . He wondered if his sister was alright he hadn't seen her since he left Reach on the Infinity. Most likely she was being cared for by the AI after all they were nothing if not truthful they intended to make peace through force. As long as she didn't resist they wouldn't hurt her. That offered him little comfort however she would still essentially be enslaved. His dark thoughts were interrupted when they began hearing shouting to the right of where their group was currently situated. The three marines took off in a sprint towards commotion Alex following closely behind albeit reluctantly. They found several Marines and royal guard sprawled out onto the ground. Deep claw and teeth marks scarring their skin and armor. Most were unconscious but there were still a few who hadn't passed out yet. Though all he could get out of them when they did speak was a bunch of garbled nonsense. The entire area went silent when they heard several twigs snap to the left of the group.

The three marines looked on in terror at what appeared to them as nothing. To Alex however he could clearly see the slight shimmer of Vykan's cloak. His friend stood there as still as possible so that the three wouldn't see him. Finally after some tense seconds the marines seemed to relax and looked away from the disturbance. Alex could see Vykan slinking away from the whole thing. So he sent an unappreciative glare his way though he would never know if he saw it or not. After that little incident Alex busied himself buy dressing and studying the wounds on the men in the clearing. He knew for a fact no normal reptile could cause this much damage perhaps if the user was in hybrid form. That thought was quickly ruled out however because One-eye had specifically said that they had not been seen outside of their beast form to prevent being recognized. So that ruled out all small lizards no matter how deadly. If he had to guess this was some kind of large lizard an alligator or komodo dragon perhaps. That or some local species he was unaware of.

He called the marines over to discuss his thoughts with them. They just dismissed his findings however by saying that the Lieutenant had already figured out what the users beast form was. When he questioned them about what exactly the thief was they couldn't come up with a solid answer between the three of them. They spent a good fifteen minutes arguing about what the zoan was before Alex got fed up and yelled at them angrily. That little outburst however released a small amount of his power knocking all three onto their backs he went over to them to check that he didn't hurt them. He had mixed feelings on the results of the pulse of energy trees and other plants were now bent away from where he had just been standing and his three companions were currently lying on their asses out cold. He heard a ringing noise coming from the pocket of one of them. So he reached in and grabbed the loud object before sighing at how absolutely ridiculous he would feel talking on the small snail rested in his palm. He pressed the button to answer fully expecting the gruff voice of the Lieutenant to come out of the creature. That expectation was completely shattered when a soft feminine voice came through. "So you have a devil fruit power to right Alex?"

He immediately felt threatened by the tone the person was taking. "Who is this if I may ask?" Alex questioned with no small amount of caution.

"Well I can't just tell you who I am where is the fun in that. Hmm how about you just call me what you've been calling me The Thief."She replied.

Alex growled at the toying tone in her voice. "Then how do you know who I am?"

"I've been watching you and your sneaky little friend since you got to the island. And don't worry I'm not stalking you I keep track of everyone who comes and goes from this island. And might I say I never expected you to have such a potent power in you."

He didn't know whether to feel freaked out or insulted so he just settled for both. "So you're the one who stole the fruits and you also know V and I."

"Oh yes and the one I ate was very useful I could smell an entirely new creature before your ship even made land. I never expected something like what I saw but it does allow me to warn you."

His eyes squinted in suspicion. "And what exactly would you like to warn us about."

"Why the bounty out for your head of course your friend may not be wearing that golden armor he has in the wanted poster but he is easy to recognise all things considered which is why you should keep your friend away from One-eye he's a greedy fool."

Alex's eyes widened she couldn't be talking about Arbiter could she if that was the case then he could easily see how locals would confuse the two.

Her voice came through the snail once again this time however she seemed actually worried "look you won't be able to leave this island peacefully if you go help the so just don't and help me instead. The world government is nothing but corrupt officials you won't be able to find any help from them."

If she was right then they didn't have any hope of help from the government. This woman had backed them into a corner because if she was wrong and they ran they would end up wandering helplessly. Really his only options at this point was to help One-eye in his search for this woman and get their ship repaired and leave as soon as possible. Or they could take the alternative and help her in which case they would be labeled as criminals or possibly even pirates then again if she was telling the truth than the outcome would be the same either way. So did he trust and help her or risk speaking with the lieutenant. He cursed under his breathe and threw the helpless snail into the forest as hard as he could. He left the stupid marines on their own in the woods and ran in search of the lieutenant so he could get this whole mess over with. He did eventually find them but only after every weapon in their hands had been aimed at him did he realize he was surrounded. And a machete was pressed against his neck.

"You Alex Newman are under arrest for aiding a criminal." Lieutenant One-eye stated with a smug smirk written all over his face.

"Aiding a criminal? i'm innocent i've done nothing."

"On the contrary I believe you know well who we're talking about. He reached into his coat with one hand and pulled out a bounty poster. On it was written. Wanted Dead or Alive and then showed a picture of the Arbiter very clearly. The reward at the bottom stated that he was worth 20 million beri. He began to grow nervous when he saw it because he now knew that that woman had been genuine with her warning.

His smirk grew even more infuriating when he held up a small black snail. "I heard that entire conversation you had with that thief golden armor a new species who else could it be but this beast." he said pointing at the bounty poster. His smirk was wiped clean off his face when he was thrown to the ground by some unseen force. A two pronged blade materialised above the lieutenant. And a voice began demanding he take back his words. Before Vykan could remove the man's head a marine tackled him from the side revealing his appearance to the world his energy sword was held in a clenched and very angry grip. For a few moments nothing happened as all the marines stared at his appearance. Until it was broken by an angry bark from the lieutenant. "What are you morons doing just standing there capture them!" Then the fight began Vykan would cut down man after man. He would parry and counter with his right hand because of his armor's defenses the primitive swords were doing nothing. After he would redirect his enemies strikes he would then proceed to run them through with the searing hot blade. On occasion he would even redirect their strikes into their allies that had surrounded him. He had finally managed to cut down all the men. And he then proceeded to walk towards the lieutenant in a show of how much larger he was. Oddly enough the Marine seemed unthreatened by the intimidating approach.

The two stood face to face. Glaring at eachother hatefully. "Take back your words or I shall cut you down where you stand." Vykan snarled at him.

The lieutenant looked up at the larger being defiantly. "Make me you beast."

That did it the Sangheili was furious now. He brought his blade forward intending to tear the human to pieces. Only for it to be stopped by the oversized machete. The two locked eyes fury clear in both. One-eye struck next bringing his machete up vertically in a ferocious strike. Which Vykan took full force to the chin tearing a large bloody scar along his nose. His hand touched it gingerly before pulling away and seeing the blood staining his hand. He roared at the smaller being in anger knowing now to avoid his attacks. And so two blades clashed once again The Marine using his smaller stature to his advantage and Vykan attempting to overpower the man with his superior strength. Vykan would thrust only for his opponent to dodge with skill and deliver a strong slash to where he had left himself vulnerable. This forced Vykan to stumble backwards to avoid the sharp blade. Leaving him open for the lieutenant to take advantage of. Alex could see the blow coming that would kill his only companion. So he did the only thing he could think of he let his power run lose. He charged forward and kicked the Marine in the side with all the force he could muster. He could feel the man's ribs shatter under the force of the blow. And if the scream of pain that came from his lips was anything to go by then the man would probably be crippled for the rest of his life.

With a crack like thunder his powers surged outward in a powerful shockwave directed straight into the man's side. He was sent hurtling through the forest at blinding speed eventually Alex could no longer see him over the tree line. Alex collapsed onto one knee feeling drained from letting all of his energy out in that attack. He sat in that position for who knows how long trying to catch his breathe.

Alex lay sprawled on the ground from exertion while Vykan hovered over the Human trying to rouse him from his slumber. He heard very faint footsteps approaching from behind him. He whirled around as quickly as possible to confront the coming threat. What he saw surprised him there before him stood a lizard like creature that stood nearly as tall as he himself did. It stood on two long legs with small clawed arms resting just under its body it had row upon row of blood stained teeth and a long whiplike tail that swung lazily behind it but by far the most prominent feature was the massive sickle like claws situated on each foot. It was a light grayish blue color. And its crimson eyes had vicious cat like pupils in them. It seemed to observe his every move with curiosity before it shook its head and began to change. The beast grew more human by the second and about halfway through the change he could tell it was female based on the body shape. The change ended abruptly leaving a human woman with long black hair standing before him. She pulled out a bag that she had been carrying with her and took out some clothes to wear while she discussed with the two of them. She returned shortly after without a word before dumping a bottle of water over Alex's face. He jumped up sputtering from the sudden chill the water brought with it. He asked Vykan what was going on to which he explained. That this woman was the thief that they had been hired to find by the king. "Ok I already talked to her earlier she seems to have good intentions."

Alex began again "She tried to warn me of this before it happened" he said motioning at the clearing around them. "Anyway thanks for trying to warn us I was an…" he stopped mid sentence when his eyes finally cleared out enough to get a good look at her. She was staring down at him with an expression that clearly showed that she was pissed. Her arms were folded under her chest. But it wasn't the angry expression nor was it the lack of attire that could cover her completely. No in fact it was just who she was. Because standing before him was none other than princess Nalia of Sairia.

And with that realization came another thought "Why am I always the one to get in the middle of these disasters. Can it be someone else for just once."


	6. The first encounter

**Author's Note: Ok sorry for not updating but my wifi has been down for the past several weeks. In any case I had a rather hard time writing this chapter mainly because I wasn't really sure how I should portray some of the scenes.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Halo or One Piece**

"Are you two both morons or something I went out of my way to warn you about this happening and yet you ran straight into their hands instead of being smart and leaving!" Alex masaged his temples trying to stave off the aching in his head as the princess screamed her lungs out. "On top of that a Marine warship was placed just out of our territory for a situation just like this if the captain thinks there's even a chance that I'll escape with the other fruit then they'd be authorized to enter our territory. All because my dad feels we need their protection and now because of his orders they'll be making landfall any minute now!" The rant abruptly came to an end when she noticed the two were paying little or no attention to her in Vykan's case. She smacked the large alien in the face with all her might. But only gained a small flinch and his attention in the form of an angry glare.

His jaws split open in a snarl and he attempted to reply only to be cut off when she began screaming again. "I can't believe the two of you you act like you don't even care that a navy captain is coming to this island specifically to hunt me" she pointed to her chest and then pointed to the two of them. "And now to hunt you as well." That seemed to catch Vykan's attention but Alex was still more preoccupied with his pounding head than he was paying attention to her. She lashed out in anger and buried her foot violently into his crotch. He went down in seconds clutching his private parts in pain that oddly wasn't present. Of course he didn't realize this until he was already rolling around on the ground.

He sat up quickly in order to regain what little dignity he still had left. He felt refreshed from the attack but it was a strange feeling getting kicked their and NOT feeling like he wanted to die. He didn't think he'd ever get used to feeling refreshed after something like that. He sat there for a moment lost in the feeling of relief that came with the boost of energy. He looked at the princess for a moment before putting his own two cents into her little rant. "To be fair you didn't exactly try to help us you set us up if anything." The comment only seemed to make her angrier.

"How was i supposed to know they would be eavesdropping on you I was only trying to help you two idiots!" Alex rested his chin on his fist as she vented more thankfully not on either of them this time.

Vykan decided to but in just then. "If you had any common sense you would have known they would be watching us closely because we where an unknown."

The small woman got right up into the large aliens face. "Don't you even try to lecture me about how the world works I know better than most how to deal with the marines!"

Alex had had enough at this point he shot up and began shouting at her as well. "Look Princess" he practically spat that word. "Intentional or otherwise you set the two of us up there and i say that's at least worth an apology. Now if you can't give us that I really doubt that you can help us in our current predicament." The two glared at each other with an unmatched fury in the eyes of both eventually the both of them backed off slightly.

Nalia brushed her hand through her hair trying to determine what she should say. Eventually she growled and addressed the two once more. "Fine I'll help you get off the island but you have to promise this little meeting stays between us. Alex nodded somewhat satisfied with the terms. Vykan however was less enthusiastic about the entire situation.

"How are we supposed to trust your word you may just turn us in as the criminals you forced us to become." He practically snarled at her for thinking they should trust her.

"Like it or not we're all in the same boat at this point and I'm willing to risk my neck to get you two morons off the island. So I damn well deserve some appreciation." she replied with an angry scowl plastered across her face.

"Now if you two can lay low for awhile I have to set some stuff up for this little escape to be even remotely successful." with those parting words she stormed off.

Vykan looked to his friend when the princess was out of sight. "I do not trust this woman Alex she'll betray us." Alex only grunted in response as he sat down once again seemingly in deep thought. The two sat in comfortable silence for more than they would like to admit.

Alex finally decided to get his opinion out on the table. "I don't trust her either V but you have to admit our only real option is to trust she will help us. She knows way more about the inner workings of this planet than we do. She seemed afraid for a moment when she mentioned the Navy captain. We don't know anything about the military here a fleet could be knocking on her kingdoms door as we speak and she can't do a thing about it. If that is the case then that means she would have absolutely no reason to rat us out because doing so runs the risk of exposing her little secret." he paused for a moment to let that sink in. "you see my point here."

Vykan nodded in agreement at the sound logic behind his statement. "That still doesn't mean she won't betray us somehow it only gives us the peace of mind that she won't hand us over to the government." Alex looked up into the foliage above thinking about best and worst case scenarios.

Alex sighed in defeat when he realized his current chain of thought would get them nowhere. He stood up and stretched for a moment before reaching down to help his friend up. Vykan accepted the hand gratefully and allowed Alex to pull him off the ground. "Come on we have to hide for now I'm guessing the forest will be a good place to hide just not hear specifically given all the bodies lying around." and with that the two left to find a new hiding place.

Nalia had returned to the castle and quickly changed back into the pink dress her father insisted she wear before she went to deal with some issues that had come up after her encounter with the two in the forest. First she had to go and make sure their ship was repaired so they could in fact get them off the island. Then she had to find a way to keep them from being noticed by the marines and finally after all that was sorted out she had to figure out how she was going to keep a Navy captain from finding her out. "Ugh today is gonna be a pain in the ass and I just know it." Once she was dressed she confronted her father and told him she would go and check on how the ship repairs where going. He simply nodded his consent before allowing her to leave.

Her thoughts were stuck on how exactly she could keep the Navy captain from finding her out she had only barely managed to avoid the current marine forces but adding an experienced captain to that would make it extremely difficult to keep hidden. Of course The captain shouldn't be here for several more hours so she had to make sure she got everything set up before then. She arrived at the docks and greeted the carpenters currently working on the ship. She asked about how much longer it would take for the ship to be fully repaired. After a fairly heated debate between the two managers of the project it was concluded that it would only be several more hours before the repairs were finished. She nodded in satisfaction and thanked them for their work before she began her trek home to concoct a plan.

She sat at her desk tapping a pencil against the wood in thought trying to decide on the best course of action to get the two out of her hair and hopefully the captain by extension. She could just tell them their ship was repaired and that they should sneak on and leave when she told them the coast was clear. Somehow she just knew one of them would screw up if that's all she did. That was beginning to look like her only option though because she knew her presence would be required when her father met with the captain. That would likely be the only time the captain's men weren't actively searching the island, and that would give them the best chance of getting away. Honestly if she didn't feel so guilty for giving the two criminal status she wouldn't even worry about helping them. Her yelling at them hadn't helped her conscious either but she had been so angry that they had ignored her warning. If they had actually done anything wrong she would turn them in but she knew for a fact that they hadn't and she felt obligated to help them as a result.

She pulled at her hair in frustration. "What the hell am I supposed to do!" A knock suddenly brought her out of her thoughts the king's voice reached her ears.

"Nalia a navy captain will be here to speak with us in two hours I want you looking your best for the meeting."

"Ok father I'll prepare." she replied in a sweet tone.

Once she knew he had left she scrunched her eyebrows together and began rubbing her thumb along the tip of her middle finger. She snapped her fingers several times in thought. Two hours greatly diminished her options. It only left her time to meet with the two quickly and tell them to escape while the captain was distracted. She swore under her breath and threw on some more common clothes before jumping out her window to keep from being found out. She ran into the forest and shifted into her hybrid state so she could sniff the two out. If this worked how she wanted it to then she would have just enough time to get ready when she got back.

Alex and Vykan had seen the captain make port just like Nalia had said she would. Honestly Alex had expected a fleet based on the amount of stress the Princess seemed to be in. He had two ideas about why this could be of course she might be overestimating the crew of the ship that or the pink haired captain was much more dangerous than her appearance would suggest. At the moment all of that was irrelevant however. "Their are literally a 100 other places for them to dock and they just happen to park their damn ship right next to ours." Alex whispered to his partner in anger.

"You should be thankful that their leader isn't present it will give us time to get past her men they won't be able to react fast enough if we move quickly." Alex nodded at his friends deduction.

"That may be true but it still makes it much harder for us to get out of here than it would have been." Alex replied. "So V how do you want to do this you have your cloak but i'll be in plain sight when we try to get on the ship."

Vykan scratched his cheek in thought. His mandibles opened as if he were going to say something but thought better of it. He finally answered "It's unlikely they know your face yet act as if you are just going to the ship to pick up some supplies." Alex nodded in confirmation he knew that no matter what he did they would be able to see him board the ship. Best to not act suspicious of course with his luck they would throw him in prison for trespassing on someone else's ship or something like that.

Vykan activated his cloak to remain unseen while Alex began walking to the ship trying his best to look innocent however pointless it might be in the end. He walked leisurely past some marines who simply nodded in greeting. He held back a relieved sigh. So far so good. He began walking up the ramp to his ship when one of the marines yelled out for him to stop. He stopped in his tracks and turned to face the man that had addressed him cursing his luck the whole time. The marine that was staring him down seemed older and a bit more experienced than the rest present. He calmly walked up to Alex and began questioning him. "What are you doing here? Captain Hina has ordered that no ship is to leave this island until certain matters are dealt with." Alex was trying desperately to hide his anxiety at this entire situation. But he replied to the question.

"I left some things on my ship I was just coming to get them so I could stay at the Inn." The marines eyes narrowed at his response before he pulled out a gun and pressed it to his forehead.

"You know you're a terrible liar now admit it you're the one that attacked One-Eye aren't you" Alex was at a loss of what to do he wasn't sure his powers could absorb the energy from a bullet point blank. And he wasn't keen on testing it here. Unfortunately the marine had a different plan. Alex could see his grip on the pistol tightening. Alex was practically praying that Vykan could get him out of this alive.

A blade of glowing blue plasma shot out of nowhere and sliced the pistol clean in half. It was a moment too late however because the small ball of lead had struck Alex's forehead and he now lay sprawled motionless on the decloaked and stared at his motionless friend. His arms began to shake with rage but before he could lash out at the offending marine Alex chuckled slightly just barely enough for everyone to hear him. He slowly pushed himself into a sitting position so everyone could see the bullet flattened against his forehead. He peeled it off as an almost manic grin spread across his features The only evidence that the bullet had hit him at all was a small indent where it had struck his forehead.

He stood up and cracked his neck to appear more menacing before addressing the marine. "Well now that you know our little secret i suppose there's no point in trying to be sneaky. Oh and by the way thanks for the boost haven't been feeling great today."

The marines all took a step back the leader looking more nervous by the minute. "You're a fruit user" he said in a shaky tone.

"Oh really how did you guess was it when I took a bullet without a scratch or the part where I actually felt better after doing so." Alex couldn't help himself sarcasm was his second language after all. The lead marine yelled at the one of the others to go get the captain and that one was rather quick to agree to that plan. Alex cracked his knuckles while Vykan got into a stance so he could be prepared when they charged. "So which one of you wants to take the first crack at us."

The meeting with Captain Hina was going as well as she could have hoped. That might be because her stupid brother was actually keeping his fat mouth shut for once. Even he wasn't dumb enough to cross a Navy Captain. So far they had discussed a lot of things that could be done to capture the people responsible for the attack on One-eye. Most of them didn't worry her because the two responsible should be gone by the time their little meeting was over. She was understandably caught off guard when Hina had declared that she had locked down all the ports and that no one was permitted to leave until the culprit had been captured. The declaration had sent her into thoughts on various scenarios that could now play out.

Nalia tried desperately to keep a calm mask plastered on her face. But the inquisitive glances that the Captain had begun sending her way where only serving to increase her unease with the current situation. The doors to the throne room where flung open by a lone Marine who ran up to the captain. He stood with his hands on his knees for a moment taking in huge gulps of air in order to catch his breathe. Eventually he stood up straight and gave the Captain a crisp salute before saying what he had come here to say. "Captain Hina we intercepted a man and some...well thing trying to escape the island. The others are holding them off at the docks but they might not last much longer. The man is a fruit user we need your help to stop him."

Hina's face scrunched up in anger at hearing this news. What she did next surprised everyone however. She shot forward like a rocket and pinned the princess against the wall by her neck. "You had this planned didn't you!" she spat at Nalia in disgust. Nalia managed to choke out a weak no nut that's as far as she got.

"What's the meaning of this!" the king roared "Unhand my daughter she would never associate with criminals like them!" Hina looked at the kings rage filled eyes and met his glare head on.

"Hina saw her grow more nervous ever since Hina mentioned the lockdown. And when she heard of the news brought to us she stiffened and grew even more nervous." Hina stated in a calm yet threatening manner. "These are signs that someone is hiding something now if you'll excuse me I have criminals to capture." The king stood petrified uncertain of what he was hearing but not able to truthfully deny her words. Hina dropped the Princess from her grasp. Nalia hit the floor and coughed violently as she tried to fill her lungs again. One of the marines grabbed her and pulled her off the ground and placed her hands behind her back before putting handcuffs around her wrists.

The Captain turned to the king one last time. "Hina will bring her in for questioning if she is innocent she will be sent home unharmed but if she's not she will either be placed in prison or executed for aiding criminals." With that the small group of marines left the castle with their new prisoner in tow.

Alex was having a blast the Marines were just too easy to beat. Every time they tried to stop him it just made him stronger. If it weren't for the fact that the swords could still cut him he would feel invincible. So he just left the sword users to Vykan who cut them down with ease. While he dealt with the ones that had guns. Every blow he landed was met with the defeat of one more of them. There was a sea of shattered limbs, fractured skulls and broken ribs in his wake. Some of the marines had even decide to run away rather than face him.

Vykan was taking precautions so that he didn't kill them mainly leaving jagged burns in places that would make them unable to function properly in a fight. Alex was attempting to keep from killing them as well but it was incredibly difficult to restrain his powers. Especially since their attacks kept adding to his energy reserves. More than once he had accidentally caved in some poor idiots face. Hell he had even crushed one guys balls when he tried to grab him from behind he could still see writhing on the ground from the kick. That had made him cringe in the middle of the fight. That had sent some of them screaming away at least. Most of them were lying on the ground unconscious or in to much pain to move when a large group of more arrived.

He quickly noticed the princess being held by one of them obviously found out by the Captain. Speaking of which he could clearly differentiate and see which one that was. She stood out among them with long pink hair. She wore a marine cloak like a cape over a reddish purple two piece suit. She glared at them hatefully as she glanced around at how many of her men had been injured by the two standing before her. A fierce scowl made its way onto her features before she addressed them. "You two are under arrest for severely injuring marine officer and many of my men. As well as theft of world government property." her arms were crossed under her chest as she walked forward to confront them.

Alex looked on a bit sceptical about her capabilities and if she could contain him with what he can do now. That scepticism was put to rest however when Vykan lunged forward intent on Impaling the woman. With incredible reflexes she ducked under the thrust and kicked at his legs to sweep them out from under him. Vykan due to years of training however somersaulted over the sweep. The captain was prepared for this a black metal bar extended from her right hand and Vykan's legs passed straight through it leaving them locked in a thick metal bar.

His energy sword cut through the bindings with ease and he jumped up to face the enemy once again. Alex was surprised at the turn of events but quickly shook it off to join the fight. The two friends stood side by side analyzing their enemy. For a moment she bent over and picked up a small knife off the body of one of the downed marines. This made Alex wonder how much of the previous fight she had seen. The two friends shared a glance before they both rushed straight for Hina. Alex aimed a punch at her stomach while Vykan decided on a downward slash at her head. She surprisingly caught Alex's enhanced fist with her own hand before twisting out of the way of the blade from Vykan.

She pulled Alex towards her while Vykan recovered from his attack and stabbed forward with the knife Alex managed to avoid the worst blow but got a deep gash in his side rather than a pierced heart. He staggered back gripping his bleeding side in pain. Hina stepped back and shook the hand she caught Alex's punch with. He could see a nasty bruise beginning to form on her hand. She was definitely more durable than the other marines the same force had shattered the arm of one of her men. She now stood sideways looking between her two opponents who were now on either side of her. She finally set her eyes on Alex and rushed to confront the bigger threat.

Vykan was about to run to his aid when he noticed the princess trying to get his attention. He saw her smirk before she slammed the back of her head into her captors nose. She wrenched her hands from his grip and ran up to the taller alien. A group of marines hot on her heels. She turned around and held out her hands so that he could cut the cuffs that restrained her. He only hesitated a moment before cutting her loose she glared at her captors before her body began to shift a long serpent like tail growing and bluish scales began to cover her body. Vicious claws took the place of her fingernails and her teeth sharpened until they had jagged edges. And finally her feet shifted until they had massive sickle like claws were her big toe used to be and her knees bent the opposite direction they should. She hissed at them before lunging and tearing the weak marines apart. She ran about avoiding attacks and following up with strikes of her own teeth were buried into skin and claws drew blood.

Her hybrid form easily decimated the remaining marines once she was pleased with her work she walked up to the elite. "why are you helping us?" he asked

She considered for a moment before answering. "because I would rather help the innocent than the ones that are corrupt. And besides captain Hina had pretty much figured my secret anyway." The two rushed forward to help their friend fend off the captain.

Alex was not having a good time fighting the captain he hadn't been able to land even a single hit on her since the fight began. He on the other hand had taken quite a few injuries from the knife she was using against him. She always redirected his blows now learning her lesson from when she had caught his punch. And just when he thought he could land a hit she tried to clothesline him he had put his arms up to absorb the hit and make him stronger. What he definitely did not expect was for him to simply pass through her arm now he was squirming in desperation to free himself from the thick metal bar that now bound his arms.

She had brought the knife up above her head and was about to plunge it into his chest when a body covered in blue scales tackled her to the ground. Nalia transformed completely and buried her teeth into the captain's shoulder she knocked off fairly easily when Hina sent a powerful kick into her chest to get her off. Hina stood up and observed the scene around her Alex was stuck behind her struggling helplessly while his two allies faced her down. The princess was the first to charge her she switched back to her hybrid form to reduce her body's size and make her harder to hit. She lunged forward with her claws intent on tearing the captain's eyes out. Hina easily sidestepped the attack however and buried her knee into the princess' chest sending her rolling forward behind the captain.

Vykan wasn't far behind weapon raised prepared to strike it was a trick however he switched off the blade and switched hands at the last minute. Hina managed to grab a hold of his sword arm a moment too late to stop the quick move. He hurled the blades hilt behind her were Hina saw the Princess catch it and activate it. She was enraged that she had fallen for the simple trick and gripped the aliens sword arm tighter. She buried her foot into the elites side and pulled on his arm with all her might. After a moment a sickening snap could be heard followed by an agonized roar as his arm now fell limply by his side. Alex saw all of this take place as Nalia was freeing him from his restraints.

He got up and tried to think of a way to stop the captain he briefly told the princess about an idea he had while Hina was still distracted by Vykan. Nalia attacked the captain again this time trying to be more tactical about how she fought the captain. Alex meanwhile looked for the perfect opportunity to strike the captain with all his energy. Nalia eventually managed to get the captained positioned so that she was no longer facing him. And with that he struck. His fist launched itself straight towards the side of her face. She managed to dodge the strike by mere centimeters before trying to focus on both of them. It continued like this while one took most of her focus the other would lash out with more powerful blows. Finally Alex managed to land a clean hit pumping massive amounts of energy into it. The blow hit her in the stomach with all the power of a train. She was sent flying backwards and hit a building behind her putting a rather large crater into the previously pristine stone.

She slid down to the ground and just sat their for a moment before trying weakly to get back up her knees buckled under her and caused her to hit the ground again. Alex and Nalia took a moment to catch their breath before running over to Vykans writhing form and dragging him onto their ship while they had this small window to escape.

Several of Nalia's royal guard rushed onto the ship to help them depart as quickly as possible the ship was at sea in little time at all. Vykan was asleep in his quarters after the painful experience of realigning his shoulder.

Alex and Nalia sat at a table meeting with several of the new crew members. The royal guard had been ordered to capture her and bring her back to the castle so she could receive death for treason. Many had refused and instead came to their aid now they were banished and forbidden from ever returning to the island. Nalia included.

After the meeting she had walked off with a heartbroken expression marring her face. One of the guard turned to Alex and asked "do you think she'll be alright."

Alex considered for a moment before sighing and answering in the only honest way he could. "I don't know."


	7. Rubber and Energy Meet

**Rubber And Energy Meet**

 **Author's note:Hi everyone i'm back for the few of you who have read the story up to this point. Thank you for sticking to it this far. Now this chapter took a long time because school has been giving me one big assignment after another,and as a result I haven't had any time to work on my stories. I have been working on this with what little free time I've had however but it still ended up that i had to do it during the summer anyway here's chapter 7.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Halo or One Piece nor any music that appears in this chapter obviously.**

Alex sat on the opposite side of the ship from the island they had come to The princess who had become their new companion stood on the ramp leading down to the beach. Bidding farewell to the guard members who had accompanied them for the last few weeks. The three of them had been labeled as pirates shortly after the incident with Captain Hina. So Alex, Nalia and Vykan where now a part of an as of yet unnamed pirate crew according to the government.

As a direct result of this Nalia had all but demanded that they find a suitable town for the guards to call home so that they wouldn't be labeled criminals along with the three of them. That brought them to their current situation.

While Nalia was saying her goodbyes. Alex and Vykan were busy looking over the wanted posters they had. Both their own and several others they had come to posses during their time at sea. At the moment however they were particularly concerned about a group of five others.

The five posters sitting before them were of individuals they knew very well. The first 4 had pictures of Blue Team's helmets. The bounties on each of these ranging from 10-20 million beli. The other was a very clear image of the Arbiter in all his glory. He was wanted with a bounty of 30 million. Alex picked up this poster and looked at the name written on it. He had evidently been dubbed blade beast for the lack of his real name.

"Hey V says here he's wanted for brutally murdering a marine captain."

Vykan snorted " Most likely in self defense what I have read of these marines and personal experience tells me that they are nothing but corrupt even the highest ranking of them."

"Yeah I can understand that everything I've read is just government bullshit. I've worked to closely with ONI to not recognise a bunch of lies when I see it, and besides we know better than that. The Arbiter wouldn't harm a human without exceedingly severe reasoning."

"Killing a marine captain isn't necessarily an easy feat either if the one we faced was any indication of their capabilities. For all we know she could be one of the strongest or the weakest." Vykan replied.

"Well I don't know about you but I want to see what Blue Team did to deserve this price on their heads." He commented picking up the picture of master chief. His poster had a label under it reading "Armored Leader" The other three Spartans were labeled in a similar fashion. They were simply labeled "Armored Individual 1-3" "Well V we can at least say that the government is creative with their names."

His Sangheili friend shook his head in annoyance at the sarcastic joke before telling Alex off. "This is no joking matter Alex being affiliated with them will have us targeted even more than we already have been. Even more so should they learn of the UNSC every member could be targeted by them."

Alex frowned before giving his own response. " Yeah yeah I know was just trying to lighten the mood." he then muttered under his breathe "No sense of humor" then addressing his friend once more. "Anyway their posters don't say what they did but they do talk about their last known location. Some place called the Sabaody Archipelago."

"It's a good lead at the very least although I haven't seen anything by that name on our maps so far."

"Well maybe our new companion can help with that she's much more familiar with the ley of the land on this planet than we are. She might have an idea of where we need to go or at least a general direction."

At that the pair waited for the princess to finish up her goodbyes so that they could question her on the whereabouts of their allies. Alex waved her over as she wandered back up the ship's ramp looking slightly discouraged in doing so. Once she reached the two Alex noticed her saddened expression. "Don't worry princess they'll be fine the government doesn't have a presence on this island and the village was more than happy to take them in. They'll be safe here."

His expression quickly shifted from a serious one to a wide smile. "And besides you have us now." he said poking Vykan in the side with his elbow in the process.

She seemed to visibly brighten at his encouragement even smiling at him. Her mood considerably better she requested they stay here for a moment while she went to get something for them. She reappeared from below deck several minutes later with a small wooden chest resting under one of her arms. She sat it down next to Alex before handing him a small she spoke. "Consider this your reward for helping me and my people as much as you have." she then nodded towards the box indicating him to open it.

He shrugged and did just that but he was expecting gold or maybe some gems or something. What he hadn't expected was the large whitish pineapple sitting in the chest the fruit itself wasn't to interesting aside from the white color and jagged looking pattern covering the thick skin. No what made it such a good gift is that he knew exactly what this was one of the devil fruits of this world. He looked from her to it in a dumbfounded fashion. "Why would you give this to us it's way too valuable to just give away?"

She looked at him annoyed. "Just shut up and accept it otherwise I might be tempted to take it back."

"Ok…. well what am I going to do with it it's not like I can eat it I already ate one remember and I'm not to keen on exploding because I ate another one."

That elicited an amused smile from the former princess "I don't really care what you do with it you could sell it or take it to that organisation you keep talking about. Hell your." She looked at Vykan briefly wondering what he was before continuing "well your friend could eat it if he so please and actually be helpful next time we get in a fight."

That statement earned her a ferocious glare from the being that towered over her. She returned the glare with a smirk of her own until the two both backed down from the pointless argument. Alex took the chest and locked the fruit back in it before addressing Nalia once again. "Do you happen to know a place called the Sabaody Archipelago we need to get their it's the only lead we have on the location of the UNSC."

She seemed to grow pale at that request before asking in a panicked tone. " You want to go their of all places? What's wrong with you two? We're wanted pirates now that place would be like a death trap to us." noticing the confused expressions on their faces she realized her mistake. She had forgotten that these two weren't at all familiar with things like that.

She sighed in a dramatic fashion at her companions ignorance before going on to explain her outburst to them. "Sorry that was a bit uncalled for it's just that place is right next to marine HQ going there is like painting a massive target on your back and that's not even mentioning the tenryuubito. Who would gladly have you killed for breathing near them."

Alex understood the gravity of what she was telling them it was a very dangerous place. And their allies happened to be connected with it. Nonetheless it made everything far more difficult for them than he would like. Getting on the island would be hard much more actually searching for clues to the whereabouts of their allies. Based on everything nalia had gone on to tell them after her little freak out. They were just as likely to get sold into the slave trade as they were to get killed by other pirates or captured by marines.

They would have to weigh their options carefully if they even wanted to risk all this in the first place. That much was certain in his mind and so Alex and Vykan left Nalia on deck to go discuss their course of action. They reached the captain's quarters which Alex had claimed for himself and they both sat down on either side of a small table with a map on it. "So V what do you think do we risk this or play it safe for now."

Vykan seemed to ponder this question for a moment before giving his answer. "I don't think we should go there are far to many variables and dangers for us to account for. And I don't believe the payoff would be worth the risk" he stood up looking at the map. "I do however feel that we should head to the Grand Line. We know for a fact The UNSC is operating from somewhere within that ocean and just getting there will increase our odds of finding someone related to the UNSC."

Alex nodded at his friends sound reasoning but he wanted to raise his own point on the subject also. "V I'm no strategist you've always been much better at that than me. But couldn't you just sneak onto the island with your cloak on and search from there."

Vykan shook his head. "No that won't work my cloak is limited to maybe an hour or so before I need to let it cool down again. And besides i'm sure there's surveillance surrounding the island even getting to the shore unnoticed should be next to impossible if it is so close to a military stronghold."

"So we're basically down to two options either we air on the side of caution and stay away or we just waltz onto the island completely unfazed by the consequences. Option 1 risks us not finding the UNSC for much longer than I would like while the second gives us a chance of finding the UNSC before arrest but if we don't we're done for. Not exactly the greatest option are they V?"

"No the risks with either are greater than I would like. Not finding our allies is a frightening prospect but I don't want to risk death to reunite with them."

"We really are stuck between a rock and a hard place aren't we buddy."

"We are indeed". Vykan said in a depressed tone. "I don't see any way around this another route anything would be welcome." a deep sigh escaped his jaws before he stood up from the chair he was awkwardly sat in, and began pacing the room in thought.

After several moments of his friends uneasy wandering Alex decided to intervene. "Vykan calm down we have a long way to go before we get there this decision can wait if need be. It isn't very pressing at the moment." his friend seemed to take comfort in his words if only very little.

"Thank you Alex I'll be leaving you for now I need to rest my mind is under too much stress as of late."

Alex smiled at his friend's response "Yeah that's one thing I know without a doubt."

Vykan nodded before shutting the wooden door behind him. Alex slumped in his chair after the sangheili had left from the weight of what the three of them were getting themselves into. He straightened a little taking his own advice and not worrying at least for the moment. He pulled out his ODST helmet which in their 2 months of absence was in disarray wires and pieces protruded in every direction all making a huge tangled mess that Alex was not overly pleased with. He pulled out several tools the pelican had had within during their time on the island. He took a pair of pliers and wrenched one of the small panels off the helmet to access the important hardware beneath. This little side project had been his only stress relief during the weeks after he had finally learned to control his power, and if he was honest he loved being able to mess with the wiring and programming of the helmet….again. he hadn't done much to it while he was with the UNSC all he did was illegally download hundreds of songs so he could listen to them. No big deal. Well not anymore since the infinity was probably the last remnants of the UNSC. He pushed those thoughts to the back of his mind before resuming his work on the helmet.

It had been about a week since they had left the guard members on their own and Nalia was in a somewhat sour mood. It may have been the fact that they were set to reach the Grand Line within the next few days and her 2 companions were completely unprepared for the dangers that lurked there. Of course it could also be the horrendous noise that was emanating from the captain's quarters at the moment. Perhaps even a combination of both but right now all she wanted to do was stop the assault that was being made on her ears. She slammed her fist on the door several times in anger. "Alex what the hell is that terrible sound!" she demanded.

The noise abruptly stopped before the door was practically thrown off its hinges by Alex. He had an equally angry expression on his face as the princess did. " that noise as you call it happens to be one of my favorite bands. So don't insult them."

"A band? I can hear that it's music but it's absolutely horrible. I hope the rest of their songs aren't as bad!" Nalia said folding her arms over her chest and putting on a smug smirk

Alex's scowl deepened at this. "That was Indestructible by Disturbed It's only one of the best songs ever written,and from now on it will be my theme song because I am indestructible now!" Alex replied back in a haughty manner.

Nalia snorted at this. "Hardly hand me any sharp object and watch me drive it into your arm and that's not even mentioning Haki."

Alex was visibly pissed after her latest comment. He walked back into the captain's quarters his fists clenched at his side. Nalia looked at him guessing his intentions the frown reformed on her face. "Don't you dare turn that crap back on Alex I swear if you turn that back on i'm going to kill you." the music started blaring throughout the ship again Alex walked out with a smirk singing along as loud as he could.

"You will be shown How I've become indestructible. Determination that is incorruptible. From the other side a terror to behold. Annihilation will be unavoidable. Every Broken enemy will know that their opponent had to be invincible…" Nalia cut his singing short when she lashed out and buried her fist in his nose.

"Will you just shut up and turn that noise off before i break whatever is making it!" Alex rubbed his nose surprised by the sudden blow from his companion. But that surprise quickly switched to anger and he shot his own fist at her careful to restrain all of his power. She dodged easily enough and from their the fight quickly devolved.

Vykan was coming down the stairs to speak with Nalia and Alex about their current heading. When he heard Alex's music playing at a particularly high volume and several crashes coming from his destination. He quickened his pace intent on seeing what the struggle was. What he found caused him to groan in exasperation over the immaturity of his two friends. The two were sprawled out on the floor Alex had Nalia in a headlock trying to get her to submit while the princess had shifted into her hybrid state. Her hands were gripping the arm around her neck tightly and her snakelike tail was currently wrapped around Alex's neck trying to cut off his air supply.

Vykan cleared his throat in order to get the attention of the two. Hearing the sound they both looked in his direction. Both growing embarrassed at the pointless fight they had just been caught having "Well if you two are done with your…" he paused trying to think of what to call their current situation. "Argument I believe we have reached the mountain you have been leading us to princess."

The two of them quickly unraveled themselves from one another and Nalia began heading up to the deck to see if he was right. Vykan turned to Alex "What happened?" he demanded

"She insulted my music i wanted her to leave me alone to listen to it but she wouldn't leave and kept telling me to keep it off"

"You made it louder didn't you?" Already knowing how much Alex loved his music.

Alex gave a sheepish yes causing Vykan to sigh in annoyance at his friends confrontational personality. "Im going up onto the deck to speak with Nalia about our heading you should turn that off and come apologize to her it might help her be more accepting of your taste in music."

Nalia looked at reverse mountain carefully analyzing their surroundings. Something she noticed almost immediately was that they were approaching the mountain much faster than she had anticipated. The wind was clearly moving much faster than it had been before on top of that they were already caught in the current leading towards the mountain.

She rushed up to the helm trying to avoid the large rocks that were beginning to show from under the waves. By the time the other two had returned to the deck the ship was caught in the dangerous current and the rocks were getting larger. "You guys close the sails as fast as you can or we'll be crushed against these rocks." The two took stock of their surroundings and realizing she was right set about doing what she asked. They undid the main sails first and then moved onto the smaller ones to reduce the amount of wind in them as soon as possible. Meanwhile Nallia was wrestling with the wheel in a desperate attempt to keep them above water. She was nearly thrown off the wheel when the side of the ship hit a particularly large rock spire that jutted from the waves.

"Hey Nalia could you be any rougher with the steering i feel like it's a good day to drown!" alex yelled.

Easily picking up on the sarcastic jab she growled and the yelled over the sound of the water. "You try steering this thing in these conditions I'd like to see you do better!"

"Save the arguments for later you two let's just work on living through this!" Vykan scolded them. Shortly afterwards the ship hit a rock hidden just under the waves throwing Alex to the ground in the process.

"Shit how many more of these rocks are there!?"

"We're almost to the mountain Alex after this we'll be in the grand line."

"This better be worth the effort we're putting in."

"It will be as long as you find your organisation." Nalia said as the water began to speed up the side of the mountain dragging them along with it.

The three of them held on to anything anchored down to keep from being thrown from the ship. Alex held onto the railing, Vykan gripped the mast with all his strength and Nalia held onto the parts of the wheel that didn't move. The water dragged them up for nearly an entire minute before depositing them at the peak of the mountain. There was a short moment of calm before they began hurtling down towards the other side of the mountain. Alex noticed something massive and black approaching them incredibly fast. "Nalia What is that!?"

The object was soon revealed to be a massive whale with scars all over its nose and on top of those was a poorly drawn Jolly Roger. Nalia tried desperately to avoid the creature with what little control she had. But it was no use the whale was blocking the entire passage. The three braced themselves for impact hoping that the ship remained intact. The ship smashed into the large nose with the force of a train and much to their horror the ship was crushed like paper against the whale's thick hide. All three were thrown off the ship and into the waves below Alex being the closest to the impact was thrown off first followed by Vykan and Nalia.

Vykan took a deep breathe as his body hit the water taking as much air into his lungs as possible. He knew he would have to save Alex or he would drown. That in mind as soon as he was submerged he began swimming amongst the rubble in search of his friend. It took him but a few moments to find the human he was looking for. He swam desperately towards his sinking friend pushing any floating debris out of the way as he made his way towards Alex. Vykan grabbed the outstretched arm as soon as it was within reach. The fear in his friend's eyes compelling him to reach the ocean surface as soon as possible. They both reached the surface one gasping for air and the other swimming them towards shore. Vykan hauled Alex up onto dry land before pulling himself up onto the rocky shore. He sat down next to his human friend who was currently taking deep breathes in order to calm his nerves.

Eventually Alex realized something and began to panic. "Vykan where's Nalia?" The Elite swore before leaping into the depths once more remembering that she had the same weakness as Alex. He swam around looking for her desperately he found her in short order but she was being carried by a blonde man who had his arm around her stomach. He swam up next to him and the blonde human almost dropped her when he saw the sangheili swimming alongside him small air bubbles escaping his mouth when he opened his mouth in surprise. The man suddenly tightened his grip around the princess before sending a powerful kick straight into Vykans face. His head snapped back but he did not feel much pain besides an obvious ache in his mandibles. His helmet and shields had absorbed the majority of the blow luckily for him. He shot after the man who was making a beeline for the shore most likely perceiving him as some aquatic predator. The man reached the shore mere moments before he did and he had already placed Nalia on the stone ground before Vykan broke the surface and gracefully pulled himself onto the ground and leapt into a defensive position in front of Nalia. His blade was resting in his hand but was not yet active in case the human wasn't actually a threat.

The man looked at him before speaking "get out of the way we need to get the water out of her lungs." he said this while lighting a cigarette and placing it between his lips. He tried to get around Vykan but was cut off by a glowing blue blade dangerously close to his neck. The blade was just above the skin so he could feel the intense heat emanating from it but not close enough to cause a burn.

"I do not trust you for all I know you could be one of those honorless pirates that seem to permeate this planet. No I will do it." he placed his sword away before walking over to the unconscious princess and performing several human medical procedures he had been taught for precisely this reason. Eventually the water had been expelled from her lungs and she was breathing once more but she was still out for the count. The Alien stood up from his crouched position and found Alex sitting nearby concern written all over his features and posture. He turned to Vykan with a questioning look to which he merely answered. " She will be alright." relief washed over Alex like a wave and the blonde man with the strange curly eyebrows also seemed to ease up in his posture on that news.

I'm going to take this lovely lady to our ship just to make sure she gets the rest she needs as well as good food in her system." Alex stepped between her and the man this time with an inquisitive look "can you bring us along as well as you can see we're in desperate need of a ship."

The man scowled at him and proceeded to say. " Who the hell invited you this young lady is all I care about you two are just an unfortunate part of finding such a beautiful creature." Alex was in no mood to listen to this guy's ramblings and glared right back at him.

"Like it or not we're coming with you she goes with you so do we she a friend of ours after all right V" he said looking over at the alien who was leaning against a nearby boulder with his arms crossed. Vykans only response was a small nod of confirmation.

The blonde scoffed. " Whatever if you two insist then i guess I have no choice follow me." he said waving at them to follow. "Name's Sanji by the way."

Alex picked up Nalia much to the blonde's apparent jealousy and followed closely behind them.

When the two had left Vykan reached down into the water and pulled up a large rucksack that was floating by. He looked into it to find it almost empty aside from a few sniper rounds. He nodded to himself satisfied that it would be sufficient for his purposes. With that he jumped back into the water to salvage whatever he could of their supplies.

Alex was honestly unsure of how to respond to the odd array of personalities that now surrounded him. The Blonde chef who seemed to follow their navigators every whim. The Navigator herself who was on the shore talking to an old man named crocus. The one with a nose that was too long to be humanly possible who claimed he was the captain but by the rest of the crew was identified as their sniper. The green haired swordsman who was currently napping against the railing along the edge of the Ship. and finally the legitimate captain of the crew who was currently hopping around Alex like a maniac and releasing questions faster than he could keep track of. One he could pick out however was a constantly repeated request for the two of them to join his crew. The chef Sanji Alex reminded himself finally butted in to stop the onslaught of questions.

"Luffy it isn't just the two of them you know there's three of them." The captain suddenly stopped and his eyes suddenly started darting between him and Nalia who had been laid on a bench for the time being.

"Eh but there's only two of them?"

"You idiot one of them isn't here right now!"

Alex groaned quietly to himself great the captain was a dumbass.

"Besides i don't even know why you would want him on the crew he seems useless to me." Sanji stated.

Alex was about to defend himself from the insulting comment when longnose did it for him. "Hey Sanji shouldn't we at least see what he can do before we jump to conclusions?"

Sanji snorted at this "I think the woman they had with them was the only one of any use to us."

The Navigator Nami chose this time to walk back onto the ship. " I think it's a good idea we should give them a chance to prove themselves to us?" The cook seemed to do a complete 180 upon hearing this statement.

He reached over and started shaking Alex's hand without warning. "See just as I was saying Nami-chan we should let them join the crew they could be valuable members." he did all of this with a lovestruck expression and he had his arm around Alex's shoulder like they had been friends for years. Alex tried to keep his obvious confusion at bay in the face of the crew he had just met. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Vykan making his way up to the ship while the rest of them were distracted by the cook's sudden shift in thinking.

"Hey V took you long enough." he commented good naturedly he squirmed his way out of the cooks grasp and walked over to his friend who now had large rucksack hanging over his shoulder. He looked at the bag in a questioning manner. "What were you doing?" he asked.

Meanwhile the strawhat crew looked on dumbstruck at the ease that Alex conversed with the towering beast like creature. That was easily 2 feet taller than any of them. Usopp ran screaming into the bowels of the ship in terror of the creature that was standing in front of them. Meanwhile luffy's jaw had literally hit the floor when he had laid eyes on Vykan. The Captain looked on with stars in his eyes. "So Cool!" he exclaimed and then shot towards the massive Alien. The conversation that Vykan and Alex were having was cut off when the captain of the ship suddenly appeared between them and stared back and forth between them intently. He closed his eyes and nodded to himself for a moment before a wide grin grew on his face and he exclaimed. "Will the three of you join my crew!?"

Vykan rose a brow at the Humans odd behavior before sighing " We thank you for the offer but we have a job we must do we will accompany you until we can procure our own ship but no longer than that." The captain tilted his head to the side in a confused expression. Nami walked over in order to explain Vykan's answer to luffy.

"He says they'll go with us until they find their own ship but they won't stay after that." The captain deflated at this revelation for a moment but was quickly back to his usual self.

He smiled happily at them showing off all of his teeth "Well for now we have three new friends to enjoy our adventure with. So let's enjoy it while we can." He suddenly threw his arms in the air and yelled "let's set off!" Vykan looked at his friend in a silent question.

"Yeah they're an odd group even by our standards but it's our only option at the moment so we have to deal with it." he watched the captain stretch his arms up to the crow's nest to lift himself up there. He watched the boy wave goodbye to the old man and the whale. The old man returned the gesture and the whale seemed to recognise the gesture as well, because it bellowed out its own goodbye. Yes this was certainly going to be an interesting trip with such… eccentric companions.


	8. Legion

**Author's Note: Hey everyone i'm back with the 8th installment of Forging On and i appreciate everyone who has favorited and followed this story. sorry if my updates are infrequent my life outside of fanfiction takes priority over this. Anyway we'll be switching back to the infinity for this chapter so we can see what their up to. Just in case any of you wanted to know what Maddie and the rest of the infinity crew have been up to. Please remember to comment on your thoughts.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Halo or One Piece this is called fanfiction for a reason after all.**

Captain Thomas Laskey was thoroughly pissed at the Arbiter for the moment the two leaders were butting heads over Blue Team's last mission. Their scouting of islands had come up with a place known to the locals as the Sabaody Archipelago. They had uncovered another of those strange fruits in the hands of a small pirate crew on the island. As a result of his orders they had brought the crew down and confiscated the fruit so it could be placed in quarantine. "Ok yes all that I understand but how did that lead to you." he glanced pointedly at Thel "killing an official of the most powerful government on this planet."

Master Chief stepped up to further explain the situation. "Sir the Captain confronted us first he was only interested in the fruit we had just confiscated we naturally refused him due to how dangerous this could possibly be." he said before tapping on the chest they had confiscated that currently contained the fruit.

"Our refusal seemed to only anger him and he began to demand it in a more forceful way he stated that he was working under the authority of a tenryuubito. Though we don't know the significance of that statement yet." he was cut off by the Arbiter.

"That statement is not entirely true I explored the island whilst they were dealing with the pirates. I know what these tenryuubito are they are called world nobles they look down upon everyone and even where helmets because they believe even breathing the same air as the common people is beneath them. I watched one of these so called nobles kill a man for even stepping within ten feet of him."

Laskey's face contorted into a disgusted scowl alongside The Arbiters own expression of anger. "As a result of the Spartan's continued refusal the captain launched an attack on us his revelation of his affiliation angered me greatly and his attack provoked me into striking him down."

There was a tense pause between the two leaders before Laskey finally responded. "Fine I can understand that reasoning but that doesn't mean the whole thing couldn't have been settled peacefully. You could have brought the captain in to negotiate or even done the negotiation yourself. Because this is possibly the worst case scenario you've put us in the five of you are wanted criminals now. And if we ever did reveal ourselves for a potential alliance that would make us immediately suspicious to them."

The Arbiter growled and slammed his armored fist into the table they were sitting at in the mess hall. "Don't you see there is no negotiating with them. What i saw on that island goes against everything both of us stands for. The man that damn noble killed had his son with him and when the boy was crying over his dead body that…. Beast had the gall to kick him in the face the poor boys nose was broken when I came to help him. And that is not even the worst of what I saw from these nobles. While I was trying to help the boy find his mother or at least someone he knew. A man ran into the streets screaming for help he was naked besides a large black collar around his neck he kept pulling at it in an attempt to remove it. But not one person lifted a finger to help they even backed away from him. I was going to help him as well but the boy I was with stopped me. The look of horror on his face told me that this was a fairly frequent occurrence. And you know what happened the collar exploded and blew the man's head off. That man was a slave to those nobles not only do they condone a slave trade but they kill any that escape in the most brutal way I can imagine. I would not ally with these monsters even if i had no other option!"

"Believe me Thel I understand your concern but what other options do we have?! We don't have the resources to rebuild after the crash and now that the 5 of you are wanted men we may never have the resources we need!" Laskey said his voice rising steadily in volume. "And furthermore your council is something I always took into consideration but your honor as a sangheili is getting in the way of your better judgement you need to look at this from the standpoint of what's best for us right now despite what your beliefs may say about it!"

The mess began to clear out as the argument between the two leaders grew out of hand. "My honor. My Honor and instincts is what has made me the leader my people see me as! I show respect where it is deserved and justice where it is needed and believe me these nobles deserve a death sentence if they are all like that waste of space I encountered!"

"You know well that I agree with you Thel, but unless we find allies on this planet we may never leave it. with millions of workers it would take years to build a ship like the Infinity! And we have just over twenty-five thousand personnel including your people! We're out of options because you may have just ruined our last one!"

The Arbiter was about to spit back a retort but was cut off when Roland interrupted the argument "I'm sorry to disturb you sir but several seconds ago an unggoy grabbed the box containing that fruit and ran away with it."

"What?" he growled before turning to Thel "We'll finish this conversation later." Thel snorted before stalking off to his own quarters.

Laskey turned to Blue Team and addressed them. "You 4 come with me we don't know the full extent of these fruits I want you there in the event of anything going wrong. Just be ready for anything." Chief nodded his confirmation before pulling the rifle off of his back.

"Roland track down that unggoy for me and hurry hopefully we can reach him before he eats that fruit."

"He was last seen entering the supply closet on the first floor of the command center he hasn't come out yet he's most likely attempting to open the chest right now."

Laskey frowned "Alright let's go find him hopefully nothing serious has happened already." They began making fast progress towards their target before Laskey asked Roland. "We only have a handful of grunts among us which one is it?"

"He's an Unggoy by the name of Eltug. He's been the ringleader of the few Unggoy we do have among the crew since they joined the infinity. Recently he has been talking with the huragok who manage the generators."

"That's a bit concerning typically the grunts don't like to associate with the engineers do you know what they were discussing?"

"You probably shouldn't be concerned Captain mostly Eltug talked about his experiences on Sanghelios his twenty brothers and sisters and occasionally how boring the engineers are."

"Well ok I suppose we can look into that more later but right now we should focus on stopping whatever he might be doing."

Soon after the captain and Blue Team arrived arrived at the supply closet. Laskey stood to the side and nodded to Chief who gave a curt nod back. With his powerful armored boot he kicked the door off its hinges before rushing in with his rifle raised at the two grunts sitting in the closet. Both had a tight grip on the strange fruit and were currently trying to yank it out of each other's grasp. The part that confused Chief the most however was that the two looked identical.

Laskey and the rest of Blue Team cautiously made their way into the closet as well. Laskey immediately noticed the massive bite that had been taken out of the fruit which was very concerning. The two Unggoy finally took notice of their audience. Stopping dead in their tracks the two looked at the humans in the room. Before glancing at each other at almost the exact same time they pointed at each other and yelled "It was him!"

Laskey's alarm was raised as he notice that the two were nearly identical. "Roland was their any point where another grunt entered this closet?"

"No why do you ask?"

"Because i'm looking at two of them right now."

"that shouldn't be possible sir there is no evidence of any unggoy entering the closet besides our fruit bandit here."

Laskey bit his lip in thought for a moment before walking forward and snatching the half eaten fruit from the two and placing it back in the containment box that had been stolen. "Chief cuff these two up and bring them with us we'll need to interrogate them." grabbing the cuffs that Laskey handed him. He cuffed the two together and began dragging them along behind the group. "Chief I want you to throw these two in a cell for now we'll talk with them later i have a discussion to finish with the Arbiter."

Chief nodded and dragged the two prisoners deeper into the building the rest of blue team tagging along behind him. The two grunts started complaining and blaming each other shortly after blue team separated from Captain Laskey. The two kept claiming their own innocence and blaming the other for the entire situation. Fred eventually got fed up and commented "are these two ever going to shut up?"

Kelly glanced his way and remarked dryly "what did you expect their grunts?"

"yeah but this is annoying even for them." Fred replied

Chief suddenly felt the resistance from the two grunts increase he turned his head quickly to see what the two were doing what he saw was probably the last thing he expected. The two grunts seemed to be growing far larger than they should ever be. This went on for a few moments all blue team ducked into cover expecting some form of explosion based on the sudden swelling. After several moments with no blast chief and the rest of blue team peaked out from cover to find not two but four identical grunts running down the hallway away from them. Linda was the first to jump into action taking aim with her rifle she nailed one of them in the back of the head only for the head to explode into a cloud of black dust before the body crumbled away into nothing. The cloud of dust obscured the other three preventing blue team from gunning the other three down.

Chief led the charge after the other three grunts the rest of his team hot on his heels. "Roland tell Laskey about what happened we may need support if this keeps happening!" Chief yelled

"He's already aware chief we're tracking the three right now. The closest is heading for the armory but we need you going after the one heading for the mess hall. Osiris is heading to intercept the closest at the armory."

"acknowledged" and with that blue team turned down the next hall leading to the mess hall.

Laskey sat in the command next to his newest intelligence officer Maddie. Completely human once more she had become a valuable advisor to him once he learned of her potential. Roland had elected to give him access to her files because ONI most likely didn't exist anymore. And their regulations were essentially void if that was the case. Needless to say Maddie had an astonishing resume even without her newfound abilities. She had offered herself as a test subject in an ONI project that would improve the human mind. In exchange ONI would allow her brother to go through ODST training despite his inexperience.

The experiment was a success in that she could now learn and process information even faster than a Spartan could. But was ultimately deemed a failure because it generated powerful emotional responses in her that couldn't be controlled and an emotional response like that was not suited for one of their agents. This explained her extreme reaction to her brothers demise. Since then Laskey had been using her incredible mind to help in tactical decisions.

She had learned to control her strange new ability in a matter of days and had escaped her containment on multiple occasions. The most recent using her full spider form she had escaped through vents and proceeded to completely outwit osiris when she trapped the four in a massive web within the forest of the island. Since then Laskey had her helping him in many situation and osiris had even taken the liberty of training her in combat tactics to better help her decision making.

At the moment however she was sitting next to him stress written all over her face as the two leaders argued on a course of action once more. Laskey could see her trying to distract herself from the conflict by looking through the files the two leaders had given her. The captain had brought her along as a tiebreaker but so far she had not been forthcoming in that department.

Finally she raised a hand to silence the argument between the two. She glanced between the two before nervously starting her suggestion. "Well I think I may have a solution that pleases both of you." She placed a map on the table that Osiris and Blue had been working together to create. She pointed to the largest country. Before being interrupted by an excited Roland.

"Sir the fruit the Unggoy ate allows him to multiply. The two found in the closet split into four The fruit gave him the ability to multiply."

Laskey jumped into action immediately "Roland how many are there now?!"

"Three one was killed by blue team the others escaped. Sir one is heading straight for the armory!"

"Have Osiris cut that one off and send blue team after the closest to their position! Maddie I want you to come with Thel and I after the third one Palmer and her team aren't prepped for a fight and it would take them to long."

Maddie nodded nervously before chasing Laskey and the Arbiter out the door of the meeting room. Roland kept the group of three updated as they charged through the hallways. "Captain Osiris and Blue team have taken care of their targets only yours remains but he has escaped the building. I lost track of him when he ran into the forest." The group of three arrived at the door the Unggoy had escaped through shortly after receiving this news.

Laskey growled and holstered his magnum before addressing the AI. "Roland put the facility on high alert and send search parties into the forest I want that grunt found yesterday! We can't afford to miss an inch of this island."

It had been three hours since the damn grunt had went missing and the entire island had descended into chaos Unggoy had overrun the facility the defenders could barely contain the horde of grunts that was constantly throwing themselves at the defenders. "Roland what do their numbers look like."

"I'll admit sir this whole situation looks dire if our single grunt had decided to remain in the forest and not attack we would be in much worse shape. They seem double in numbers every ten minutes if he didn't start attacking half an hour ago his numbers would be just over twenty-six thousand as it stands right now it's estimated to be a little over ten thousand of them."

Laskey bit his thumbnail in thought "but their still multiplying faster than we can kill them. How are the defenses holding up?"

"For now the Hunters and Scorpions are doing a good job of keeping them at bay but the threat of being overrun is becoming a much bigger concern."

"This is bad they may force us to just bomb everything and even then if we miss one we could be in this same situation in less than an hour."

"It would take longer than that captain one could become sixty-four in an hour after that is when the exponential growth becomes an issue."

"My point still stands Roland. I don't know if there is a way out of this whole situation." Laskey sat deep in thought as he looked at the tactical map and the countdown until the next time they multiplied.

Blue team along with hundreds of marines and many of their alien allies were holding the line against the onslaught the grunts were putting them through. The situation was growing worse by the minute the defenders were quickly running low on ammunition. And they hadn't even managed to put a dent in the sheer numbers the grunts had on their side. Chief took shot after shot each bark from his battle rifle spelling the demise of another replica. bullets, plasma and every kind of weapon in their arsenal was being thrown at the waves of grunts attempting to overrun them.

A large amount of grunts finally managed to reach the forward most scorpion and proceeded to jump on top of the machine the marine manning the machine gun on the vehicle tried desperately to shoot the replicas off the machine. It was in vain however because the grunts managed to pry open the drivers hatch one grunt grabbing the marine by the helmet and attempting to pull the man out of the tank. Chief could barely make out the driver yelling at the grunt to get off of him. He also heard the replica giggle to itself before commenting back "What I'm just trying to get a head in life." every other replica within earshot erupted into violent fits of laughter after hearing the remark from their ally. This in turn gave the rest of the defenders a chance to shoot the grunts as they rolled on the ground laughing. Freeing the tank to continue attacking the coming horde.

So far explosives had been the best solution to the onslaught but they had run out of grenades and rocket launcher ammo fifteen minutes ago luckily the scorpions were still going strong. The Hunters had also been a big help there beams could incinerate multiple replicas at once the scorpions were covering the hunters and vice versa. The defense was holding up for now but the hunters were beginning to tire. And when they couldn't fight anymore the scorpions would be overwhelmed. Taking in every aspect of the battle chief came to a decision "Fred is that old scarab we salvaged in any condition for a fight?"

"That depends that scarab was never meant for war it's the mining variant. And the seawater did a lot of damage to the joints but it might be in working condition."

"Alright then Blue team let's go get that scarab hopefully it will help us turn this whole thing around." with that the spartans began making their way to the depot the scarab had been stored in." Sierra 117 to command center Blue Team is heading to retrieve the scarab from depot three and use it against the replicas."

Captain Laskey's voice responded in short order. "Are you certain? The joints aren't stable enough to sustain itself for very long the oxidation could make it collapse at any moment."

"Captain are they more stable than when we first salvaged it?"

"Well yes but.."

"Then it'll be fine they are built to withstand a lot of damage and besides without it we'll be overwhelmed soon."

"Alright chief I trust your judgement but be careful you may only have a few minutes of functionality."

Blue team was soon running up stairs to reach the platform the scarab was piloted from. The four spartans reached the controls and Fred threw his gun aside and began the process of starting the massive machine. "Chief it's going to take a minute for this thing to start up the main gun needs at least a few to heat up completely."

"That's fine but as soon as this is ready I want us in the fight."

"Yes sir!"

Maddie honestly was enjoying her mission. Perhaps it was the predatory instinct that came with her new abilities or maybe It was finally getting to use Osiris's combat training. Nonetheless she enjoyed the terrified looks the replicas would give her every time she caught them. On second thought it was definitely the spiders nature affecting her she would never be this aggressive otherwise. She was a doctor after all. And yet here she was killing these grunts one after another granted they were just soulless copies but that didn't change much in her eyes. Honestly she wished Laskey hadn't asked her to do this. Terrorizing the grunts still in the forest wasn't something she particularly liked.

Roland was convinced that if they found the original then they could stop this entire thing at the roots. And who got the privilege of carrying out this little mission. That's right none other than her! Sure she could see the logic behind the Captain's decision because she was a spider they were literally built to hunt in this kind of environment. But seriously palmer's team or Osiris could do just as well if not better than she could. She sighed to herself deciding to get back to work rather than losing herself in thought. She saw a lone grunt running towards the exit of the forest taking a line of webbing she had fashioned a moment ago she lobbed one end towards the grunt. It caught his two small feet sticking them together and causing the grunt to fall on its face. Working quickly she pulled him towards her.

The poor thing screamed desperately and grabbed anything it could to keep itself away from her. But it was no match for her newfound strength as anything it grabbed either slipped from its grasp or snapped from the strain. She eventually had its face dangling in front of hers she could see the terror in its eyes as it stared into her six. She licked her claw like fingernail leaving it coated in a yellowish liquid. Before jabbing it into the creature's neck. Like every other so far it just crumbled away as the venom entered its system. She groaned to herself and dropped the rapidly decaying corpse to the ground. She knew for a fact the amount she was putting into their bodies shouldn't kill a regular grunt they were more resilient towards venoms and toxins than the average human.

At first she had been questioning each one she captured but they all would give her the same answer which was usually terrified babbling or denial of any knowledge of the original them. Eventually she gave up and started just using trial and error hopefully one of them would live after the venom and boom she would have found the original but of course it couldn't be that simple there were thousands of them on the island after all. She suddenly heard the sound of very heavy footsteps like a massive machine. She knew they had a scarab but she didn't think it was in working order. She rapidly scaled the tree she was currently perched in so she could survey the battle. And of course the scarab had made its way into the fight the main weapon was tearing the horde of grunts apart with ease the numbers dropped in seconds from several thousand to a few hundred. That's when she heard it panicked breathing from below her she saw a single grunt running away from the fight which was strange because the rest were charging straight into the fight still. She narrowed her eyes before shooting after the grunt. She could see several from here but this was the only one running away from the fight. Leaping from tree to tree she gained ground on the defenseless grunt before pouncing on its head and knocking it to the ground. As soon as its face hit the dirt all the grunts in the area burst into clouds of black dust. She flipped the small alien over and noticed that it was out cold. She smiled to herself Laskey better repay her for doing all this for him, but that could wait they needed to contain this bastard before he woke up. She tossed the unconscious body over her shoulder and hauled it back to the base.

It only took her a few minutes to reach the base. She had called the captain ahead of time with her news and he was waiting at the main entrance with a squad of marines beside him. She tossed the limp grunt on the ground in front of him and watched as the marines bound the grunt and carried him off Laskey and Maddie following close behind they reached a small cell with a chair in the center. The marines made quick work of chaining the unconscious alien to the chair. Laskey turned to the marines and addressed them. "I want you to have a guard posted inside that cell at all times once he wakes up I want them to kill any replica he creates." The leader of the marines nodded before giving the captain a sharp salute. With that Maddie and the captain made their way up to the command deck to discuss the situation with the other officers.

Maddie noticed a growing worry in the captain as they made their way to the command deck. It seemed the closer he got the more the trepidation seemed to show in his expression. Maddie didn't know what to say at the moment so she elected to stay silent for the moment. Once they reached the command center The captain walked over to the holographic display of the island and examined the results of the battle on the landscape. Eventually after several tense moments the captain addressed the local AI. "Alright i've put this off long enough. Roland how many casualties did we suffer?"

"You'll be happy to know captain that only two marines died during the battle. They were trampled during the initial wave of replicas. That being said many more are currently hospitalized with injuries ranging from broken limbs to stab wounds luckily all of them have been stabilized."

Laskey breathed a sigh of relief Roland knew he had expected far worse from the battle it wasn't common in any battle to come out with just two deaths. "Thank you Roland please find the bodies and make sure the two are paid proper respect." Laskey sat in peaceful silence for a moment before speaking once more "Have Halsey report to the command deck immediately I have a job for her."

"Alright captain I'll notify the doctor immediately."

Maddie was looking through the many reports on the scouting missions conducted by both Blue team and Osiris. She was searching through the reports for resource rich areas and any way that they could avoid the world government and still gather the resources they needed. She already had a plan laid out but she had to double check the information. Negotiations shouldn't be difficult so long as they played their cards right. She scowled in anger as she heard a snide remark from a scientist she had grown to hate over the past weeks. "So Laskey still having your pet spider write up plans for you?" Maddie shot up prepared to defend herself from the doctor's verbal assault, but the Captain beat her to it.

"Save It Halsey I didn't call you up here to give my new tactical officer a hard time. I called because I have a job for you."

"Alright fine captain what do you need?"

"The grunt that ate that fruit I want you to find a way to differentiate between the original and the replicas he creates. Because knocking the original unconscious seems to stop the rest of them no matter how many there are."

"Are you sure you don't want me to weaponize your spiders venom it's lethal in even small doses?" she asked looking at Maddie with a smirk.

She had to resist her urge to hiss at the horrible woman. But again the captain came to her defense. "Halsey we've been over this doing that would cause her unnecessary pain you told me yourself and besides she's more valuable as my tactical officer than a guinea pig to your experiments."

"Fine Laskey have it your way but if you ever reconsider let me know." she said before stalking off to start her new job.

"Why do you keep that witch around Laskey?" Maddie asked the hate for the evident in her expression.

"Maddie like it or not she's a valuable asset to our crew as for the mutual feelings between you two she hates you because your abilities defy all logic that she could use to explain it." he responded. "But that's enough of that we have a meeting with the arbiter to discuss options and if I remember correctly you were about to make a proposition."

She nodded and laid out the map in front of the two leaders. "Alright this is the largest country in the area it's called Alabasta."


	9. The Island Party

**Author's note: I find myself with some extra free time lately so I decided to work on this rather than binge on Overwatch like I usually would. And so everyone knows this is the first chapter in the story that actually sets the plot in of them up until now have been primarily set up and background. Anyway without further ado chapter 9 The Island Party oh and P.S. the song in this is drunken sailor look it up on youtube and listen while you go through that scene and just imagine the chaos. I think i did a good job.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Halo, One Piece or any music that may appear in this chapter.**

These pirates were not at all what Vykan had expected. The impression he had gained of pirates was that they were dishonorable monsters who preyed on those weaker than them. But this group was far different than what he had anticipated. The woman was a bit greedy and the chef seemed to take an unhealthy interest in the princess who had woken up several days ago. But those traits aside they were a rather kind group if a bit… eccentric at times. He had gained a grudging respect for the green haired swordsman after they tested each other's skills. The other two were the strangest to him the long nosed man seemed to avoid him at all costs and the captain seemed to naive to be in a position of power.

In all honesty the captain only seemed to have two redeeming qualities that being his physical abilities and his strong will. Aside from that however he saw no leadership skills within the man. Vykan snorted at that the man had the mannerisms of a child he could not tell if he was simply oblivious or if he was an imbecile. He didn't seem to have any tactical sense or a way to keep his followers in line. Despite all that the loyalty his crew showed was astonishing to him. And the ridiculous amount of trust he had in people was worrying to say the least. Two people who had been enemies to them were now peacefully living on the ship for the time being.

Alex and him shared the same thoughts on the Captain and the crew, but his friend was a bit more laid back on the two people who should be imprisoned for endangering the captain's crew. He saw them as a non threat because they were weaker than almost everyone on the ship at the moment. Vykan could understand that logic but that didn't mean they deserved the same treatment as the rest of the crew or even them who were just guests on the ship. Despite Alex's reassurance that they wouldn't be an issue Vykan couldn't help but feel suspicious and cautious around both Mr.9 and Ms. Wednesday.

Nalia was the only one that seemed to share his suspicion because he could see her glancing at the two constantly especially Ms. Wednesday. He was also a bit relieved to see her skill and knowledge wasn't being dulled by how much the blonde chef seemed to pamper her. This whole situation made it seem like the two were using them for some ulterior motive, and the sangheili didn't like it at all.

He didn't have time to worry about them at the moment though after a completely random snowstorm the ship was hit by yet another freak storm this time the entire crew except for one swordsman worked together to keep the ship on its course.

Alex desperately wanted that green haired bastard to suffer a slow and very painful death after he slept through that damn storm. Apparently he wasn't the only one either. He had to stop his urge to laugh when he saw the ship's navigator punch him with all her might leaving several sizable bumps on the back of his head. Several more hours was all it took for the group to reach the island of Whiskey peak. Upon arrival the duo the pirates had been holding captive jumped onto the ship's railing and went through a rather theatrical goodbye. Before jumping into the water and swimming to shore.

"Hey look there's a river up ahead it looks like we can dock inland." nami said.

Usopp seemed to grow worried before asking. "t-there wouldn't be any monsters on this island right?"

"considering this is the grand line there's a high chance there is." Sanji answered back.

"whatever we can always just run away if there is." luffy commented.

"Yeah that's true if we're on the ship but if we're caught by them on land then we'll probably have to fight our way back." Alex said wanting to get his two cents in.

Luffy just shrugged as if he didn't care while usopp visibly paled at the thought of that. That's when Nami decided to join the conversation "you do realize we'll have to stay on this island for a while right? So the log pose can record its magnetic field."

Both the captain and Usopp looked at her with confused expressions. To which she sighed and went into a lengthy explanation about how the log pose worked. After a few minutes the explanation was over and the long nosed boy looked positively horrified. "S-so your saying we could be stuck on an island full of monsters for a few days?!"

"Yes that is exactly what she's saying but if you could get your fear out of the way you would realize that it might also take only a few hours." The long nosed boy turned around amazingly fast when he heard Vykan's deep voice behind him. As soon as he saw the towering alien he shrieked and ran to the upper deck away from the Sangheili. Vykan looked at the boy in annoyance and muttered "Coward" under his breath. Once again the ship's captain only shrugged at the whole conversation before commenting.

"eh we'll deal with it when we get there."

"Hey V where's Nalia." Alex asked as the ship slowly made its way inland.

Vykan looked at his friend curiously before answering. "She's in her quarters said she had to double check some old photos of hers."

"Double check for what?"

"She neglected to inform me on that but i do have a theory."

"Alright shoot."

Vykan nodded before continuing. "I noticed earlier in the week that the Princess kept sending Ms. Wednesday strange looks. And today I notice Ms. Wednesday sending her similar glances. They may know each other."

"So you think she wants to make sure?"

"Yes though i do not know the implications if my hunch is proven correct."

"We should probably be on our toes then to be prepared for anything." Alex finished his friend agreeing with his concern.

A sudden loud cheering erupted from the shoreline. Crowds were beginning to form as the pirate ship prepared to dock. Cheers that welcomed a pirate ship with open arms.

Shortly after disembarking the ship the crew found themselves greeted by a man named Igarrapoi who claimed to be the mayor of the town. In short order he invited them to a feast and the rest of the crew joined them with open arms. Meanwhile the three newcomers stood back for a moment. "Alex,Nalia this is obviously a trap be on guard."

"You're right it's pretty obvious but there's no harm in enjoying ourselves while we wait for them to reveal their plan." Alex remarked.

"No Alex we can't do that food and drink may be poisoned."

Nalia decided to join the conversation at this point. "No they wouldn't poison the food they most likely want to get us all drunk and capture us alive they lose part of the bounty if they turn pirates in dead." Vykan scowled at her reasoning but backed down because he saw no reason for her knowledge to be false. "Alright I need to get Ms. Wednesday alone so I can talk to her and that mayor preferably as well. I'm going to need you two at the party helping to distract them for me. Sound good?"

Alex and Vykan both gave her a sceptical look before they both begrudgingly agreed with her. "Whatever you say Princess just don't get yourself in trouble I'll make a ruckus keep them occupied for a while. Come on V let's make a scene." Alex responded Nalia saw them walk off before slinking away and shifting into her raptor form to track down her targets.

Vykan discretely tossed his drink aside while the party goers weren't looking. He had elected to sit aside and observe the ongoings. While Alex was drinking heavily he had decided to forgo the hospitality because there was a risk to it no matter how small. Alex suddenly jumped up onto one of the tables and screamed to the whole crowd in a drunken slur. "Hey everyone i'ma teach you a song." and at that he took a deep breath and started to sing. A rather fast paced song.

"What will we do with a drunken sailor?

What will we do with a drunken sailor?

What will we do with a drunken sailor?

Early in the morning."

By now he had the entire town up and dancing to the upbeat rhythm he was creating. Luffy in particular seemed to be enjoying the song as he ate his 20th plate of food. He began to sing along wildly as he ate spraying chunks of meat and fruit everywhere.

"Way hay up she rises.

Way hay up she rises.

Way hay up she rises.

Early in the morning."

Luffy jumped up next to Alex his swollen stomach bouncing the whole time. Luffy threw his arm over Alex's soldier Alex in his drunken state nearly collapsed when the extra weight was placed over his shoulders. Despite this the two started to dance and sing the song in a uncoordinated manner.

"Shave his belly with a rusty razor.

Shave his belly with a rusty razor.

Shave his belly with a rusty razor.

Early in the morning."

Vykan could see the green haired swordsman pass out after losing his 13th drinking contest ,and the navigator Nami in the middle of a drinking contest with a nun which was strange if he understood human customs as much as he believed. The long nosed man dancing around the pub in a daze along with the music Alex was conducting. The blonde chef was sitting at a table surrounded by around 20 women and gently bobbing his head as he flirted with all of the women around him. Vykan snorted in disgust at his companions and in irritation at his friend Alex. Honestly the damn pirates couldn't smell a trap from a mile away. Alex on the other hand was trained better he was supposed to be one of the elite of humanity and yet he was here making a complete fool of himself. It didn't matter he was sneaking out soon to conduct his own investigation. He got up and slunk out of the building as the chorus started once more.

"Way hay up she rises.

Way hay up she rises.

Way hay up she rises.

Early in the morning."

Alex sang with all his might uncaring about the consequences at the moment. Luffy was singing along with him but was beginning to fall asleep over Alex's shoulder. By this point they had gone through the majority of the song and where on the last verse.

"That's what we do with a drunken sailor.

That's what we do with a drunken sailor.

That's what we do with a drunken sailor.

Early in the morning."

And as the song ended Alex collapsed and fell off the table he and Luffy had been standing on. He vaguely acknowledged a loud bang and several screams as he hit the ground before completely losing consciousness.

Meanwhile Nalia had tracked her target to a small house above a cliff. She overheard her talking to her supposed partner about how they had led the pirates here despite their failed mission. She also heard them saying that they hoped it appeased their boss. Ms. Wednesday told her partner she was going for a walk to which he responded that he would make sure their boss got their message. The woman walked out and took a deep breathe and then smiling at the crisp night air. She began walking into a small forested area leading back down to the town. Nalia began following at a distance her enhanced senses in her raptor form allowing her to track her even if she was out of her sight.

Once Nalia determined she was truly alone she picked up her pace and slowly gained on the woman. Airing on the side of caution Nalia decided to jump the woman in her raptor form and drag her off the path before revealing her identity. A quick pounce and an attempted scream later Nalia had the Woman trapped under her foot with a massive claw on either side of her head. The blue haired woman's mouth was covered by a large clawed hand to prevent her screams from reaching any of her allies. Nalia hissed angrily at the woman and leaned her large snout down next to the woman's ear and whispered through clenched teeth "quiet" her distorted voice unrecognizable in her monstrous state.

The woman began to thrash as she was dragged away from the path she had taken from the house. She kicked and tried desperately to pry the clawed hand away from her mouth. The fear in her eyes turned to determination when she seemed to realize something. Nalia didn't notice her pull two small strings out of her shirt. Each one had a small blade at the end that was shaped like a feather. She then viciously stabbed one into each side of Nalia's arm.

The small blades weren't long or sharp enough to pierce her scaly hide. The sudden sharp pain however was enough to make her release her captive. The woman somersaulted away and began spinning one of her weapons in each hand. "Stay back i'm warning you!"

Nalia hissed at the woman for the dull sting in her arm. Before shifting to her hybrid form and scowling at her. "Calm down Vivi I'm not here to hurt you."

Her shocked expression was all Nalia needed to know that her hunch had been correct. "H-how did you know."

Nalia scoffed annoyed that Vivi still didn't recognize her. "As if I would forget one of my old friends no matter how young we were at the time."

With that she shifted to her completely human form to help her recognise her. Vivi's face lit up with recognition before asking. "Nalia is that you?"

At that she smiled and replied. "In the Flesh."

Vivi's face took on an apologetic expression and then said. "I'm sorry I didn't recognize you sooner it's been years since we seen each other." her face flushed in embarrassment. "but uh...what are you wearing?"

Nalia looked down on herself and was reminded of the undersuit Alex had given to her. It was meant to form to the wearers body apparently and it had worked so far. Alex had said it went under his armor but he didn't need either anymore due to his powers. It worked well it didn't tear when she changed completely and she wasn't naked whenever she changed back anymore. One thing she didn't like however was how much it hugged her figure it was certainly tight and didn't leave much to the imagination which is why she always wore something over it. Especially around that blonde chef he was amazing to her but the looks he always sent her way were creepy at best. She turned back to the other woman.

"Look Vivi it's a long story but I can't tell you right now your story seems a lot more pressing."

"Ok well where do I begin I guess it started about a year after you and your grandfather stopped visiting Alabasta. Crocodile was made a shichibukai and he started protecting Alabasta and he's even seen as a hero among the people now. But anyway around the same time an organisation started working against Alabasta."Nalia sat and listened intently to the story to make sure she got every detail. "My father grew suspicious so Igaram and I decided to infiltrate the organisation and find out their motives and who their leader is. So far we found out that they want to destroy Alabasta to create their own perfect nation. And crocodile was in fact the leader."

Nalia looked at her skeptically "you thought it was a good idea for the crown princess of one of the largest kingdoms in the world to become a spy for a criminal organisation?"

"Well it seemed like a good idea at the time."

"uh-huh not such a good plan anymore is it?"

"Well it's been working so until our cover's blown we don't want to risk being found out for my family's sake."

"Ok then I only need to tell you one thing and then you can go so your identity isn't revealed. That big lizard with us his name is Vykan and the man named Alex those two are my friends avoid hurting them if at all possible. They're going to know who you are so they won't hurt you either."

She nodded "alright I won't" Nalia smiled and thanked her before walking back into the dense forest but she was stopped when Vivi yelled "Wait!" Nalia turned around to see her wondering what she needed. "What about the pirates?"

"Them? well it's a bit irritating but we're stuck on their ship until we find our own but do whatever you want to them. I'm sure Alex wouldn't mind having his own ship again if something were to happen to them."

Vivi looked at her friend a bit questionably but shook it off and said goodbye to her old friend. And with that the two parted ways.

Vykan had been snooping around the town for about half an hour now and nothing of use had turned up yet. It would appear everyone was in the pub with the pirates and Alex. The loud explosion at the pub had been the only thing of interest but he had quickly realized that Alex had once again lost control of his abilities. Nonetheless a blast like that would at least take some possible enemies out of the picture.

Suddenly he was grabbed from behind and yanked into an alleyway. He swiftly grabbed his assailants arm and used his superior strength to flip them over his shoulder and slam their back into the ground. Now free he took a moment to analyze his attacker before realizing it was Nalia only she was unconscious due to his rough treatment of her. She was lucky she wasn't hurt worse if the cracks in the pavement around her were any indication of the force he had applied. After a moment he decided to check her pulse to confirm that he hadn't accidentally killed one of his friends. To his relief her heart was still going strong despite his rough treatment of her.

With an exasperated sigh he dragged her unconscious form away and hid her in a small crevice between two buildings. He didn't have the time to deal with her at the moment he could hear voices in the distance and he felt whatever was happening would be important.

He reached the edge of town as fast as he could and what he saw didn't surprise him. The supposed mayor of the town was discussing something with Mr. 9 and Ms. Wednesday as well as the nun he had seen earlier only now he could see her muscular form since she was no longer wearing the robes and instead she was wearing a white and pink dress. Zoro appeared on the roof of one of the buildings and began speaking to the group. Though Vykan still couldn't make out what was being said. Slowly the rest of the townspeople showed up each brandishing their own weapon.

Soon the fight between the green haired man and the town began. Vykan made up his mind that now would be as good as any to make use of his active camo. Pressing a button on his armor he appeared to phase out of existence. He soon reached the scene of the fight but did not reveal himself yet. He watched as a massive barrel was hurled at Zoro by the former nun. At this point he sprang into action he pulled the hilt of his blade off his hip and activated it as he jumped in front of the barrel. The wooden was cleaved in two both halves flying behind him and hitting the men Zoro had been keeping at bay. Beer spraying everywhere as the halves broke apart.

Zoro looked over his shoulder at his new ally an angry expression on his face. "Hey you bastard quit wasting the booze!" Vykan looked over irritated.

"Oh i'm so sorry for saving you there." he replied with a sneer.

Zoro merely scoffed "I can protect myself."

"I bet you can."

Their short dispute was ended when a man with a stone hammer tried to crush Zoro only for the swordsman to pull out his second blade and cleave it in two. Vykan was given his own opponent in the form of several of the town's mercenaries coming after him. They were easy enough to dispatch their weak guns and weapons bouncing harmlessly off his shields. Moments later in the middle off his fight he heard Zoro yell out to him "Oy Lizard face."

Vykan grew angry at the use of the nickname the swordsman and chef had started calling him after they met. He snapped an angry "What" at the other swordsman.

"Trade you!" Vykan was confused briefly until he turned around and saw one of the man's blades flying towards him. Accepting the situation Vykan deactivated his blade and tossed it at the man. They both caught the other's blade and stood back to back staring down the mercenaries. Zoro now had all three blades out one in his left hand and one in his mouth while Vykan's energy sword had been activated in his right hand. Vykan meanwhile was uncomfortable holding the sword he had been given because he had never used a human blade before and it was not designed for his hands.

"Interesting sword you got here Lizard face. Don't mind if I try it out do you?"

"So long as you swear no harm will come to it you have my permission."

"Don't worry it's different but I know how to handle a good blade"

"That statement had better be true human. And I'm not a lizard I'm a Sangheili."

Zoro only grunted in reply as he cut down another enemy this time with his allies weapon. The two made short work of the remaining mercenaries easily defeating all of the enemies. Leaving only the four agents behind. The two walked back towards the four agents Vykan reached out to hand back the weapon he had borrowed. "I have decide I don't like human blades."

Zoro snorted "Speak for yourself I may need one of these." He said gesturing towards the energy sword in his hand before deactivating it and handing it back. Vykan took back his weapon possessively to keep the other swordsman from trying to keep it.

The man named Iggarapoi addressed them saying. "Well it looks like we'll have to deal with you ourselves." Just as a new fight was about to break out their was a massive explosion in the middle of the four agents. All of which were blown back by the force. Vykan turned around to see two people approaching one a man with red sunglasses and a red coat the other a woman in a yellow dress with lemons all over it.

Ms. Wednesday and her partner managed to stand if only barely after the blast and so did iggarapoi but ms. Monday didn't recover. Iggarapoi seemed horrified when he saw the two people. And exclaimed. "Mr. 5 Ms. Valentine!?"

The man in red scowled at them. " What have you idiots been doing."

The Woman next to him giggled. And replied. "Oh come on Mr. 5 you can't expect them to be as capable as us."

Iggarapoi took on an angry expression. "So you just came here to laugh at us didn't you?"

The woman's smirk persisted. "no we're obviously here on business."

"So you came here to help us right? With you on our side those pirates don't stand a chance." Mr. 9 stated

The man in red raised an eyebrow. "What no stop joking around. Do you honestly believe the boss would send us here just to deal with a few pirates?"

In a shaky voice Ms. Wednesday asked. "Then why are you here?"

"As you know our organisation is built on secrecy no one is allowed to pry on the identity of our members. And someone has found out our boss' identity."

The woman next to the man continued. "So after some investigation we have found that an agent from a certain country has infiltrated our ranks." Mr. 9 leaped up in a panic.

"Wait a minute I wear a crown but i'm not a king!"

"Shut up idiot we know it's not you. No the agent we're talking about is someone else the Alabasta kingdom's" but she was cut off when Iggarapoi jumped up and attacked them.

Vykan was amazed that this had turned around so quickly one minute they were about to face the organization now they were being completely ignored when the group began fighting amongst themselves. He watched as the woman in yellow launched herself high into the air and came down with a powerful kick to head. The woman was driven to the ground from the force of the attack.

He also saw the mayor of the town get caught in an explosion moments later. The man in red walked through the flames of the explosion in a bored manner and began picking his nose. "As we were saying the spy is head of the Alabasta Royal guard Igaram." He said pointing at the mayor if the town.

Ms. Valentine backed away to stand with her partner once more. "and the second spy is none other than the princess of Alabasta herself Nefertari Vivi she said holding up a picture of Ms. Wednesday.

Mr. 9 suddenly bowed before the newly revealed princess. "I'm sorry Ms. Wednesday I never knew you were a princess."

Vivi got angry at the man "this isn't the time for that Mr. 9!"

He suddenly jumped up from his kneeled position and pulled out his two bats. "Well you're still the same comrade in arms as you always have been so I'll protect you. He charged forward rapidly but the man in red pulled a booger out of his nose and took aim at Mr. 9 "Nose Fancy Cannon!" with that exclamation he flicked it at the man and as soon as it hit Mr. 9 it exploded violently. Sending him flying down the street and through several buildings. Vivi seeing her partner defeated called her pet duck Carue to her side and rode him away from the two superior agents. Mr. 5 took off after her intending to kill her like his mission stated but was stopped by a massive lizard creature stepping in front of him. Vykan stood his ground seeing that the woman running was in the right in this case he prepared his sword.

"Out of my way freak." Mr. 5 growled at him.

Vykan replied defiantly "No you're staying right here with me.

"Fine no more warnings from me." Mr. 5 said before throwing his fist back intending to end the monster in front of him but he was surprised when whatever he hit didn't budge an inch from the explosion he tried to pull his arm back but couldn't. when the smoke cleared he saw his fist had been caught by one hand. The man that stood before him was none other than Alex Newman staring back at him with enraged purple eyes.


	10. Setting the path

**Author's note: Hi everyone i'm back again and before we get going I would like to thank Valtek and futureguy for consistently reviewing my story I hope you guys keep enjoying my story. And I love seeing your feedback. Oh and im also looking for a beta reader so if anyone is interested please tell me in the comments or PM me. Just so you know this chapter is shorter than usual because the divergence from One Piece's story starts here. And the darker nature of it.**

 **Disclaimer: again I own nothing here.**

Alex was absolutely pissed these bastards were the worst kind of people. Overthrowing a peaceful government for their own gain it reminded him far too much of the insurrectionists that had been responsible for his parents death. He had heard everything of their conversation and Nalia had only helped to fuel the hatred he felt for these monsters. It was people like them that has killed his parents, and because of people like them him and his sister had to fend for themselves for years. He didn't care if they weren't them but he could tell they would go just as far. And when he saw the man's abilities and when he went after Vykan one of his only friends something snapped inside him.

He had expected a lot of power in the explosion but it was still more than he had anticipated. He absorbed more energy from that blast than he had ever stored within himself before. But he didn't absorb all the power of the explosion. Yes all the kinetic force but the heat generated had seared the skin on his hand. At first he hadn't noticed due to the anger and adrenaline running through his system. But now as he let go of his opponent's hand he felt the hot pain radiating from the point of impact. He backed away from their enemies trying to shake the numbness out of his hand this was definitely not going to be a painless fight if that was going to keep happening.

He turned to Vykan urgently. "Get everyone to the ship I'll hold them off while you find everyone." Vykan wanted to protest and say he would help but he had seen what their enemies could do and he knew for a fact that he would not be much help against those kind of abilities.

"Fine Alex but you must promise that you will meet us there as soon as you can."

"Don't worry I'll be there."

Vykan nodded before muttering to himself "You better be." He then ran off to collect the rest of the crew.

Alex now sure his friend was out of danger turned to face the two agents he had just stopped.

"So um I suppose you guys probably don't want to want to be good sports and come at me one at a time do you." All he got in response was a raised eyebrow from the man in red before he shot his partner into the air with an explosion. Alex looked up to see that the woman appeared to be floating with her umbrella. He saw her smile sweetly and wave at him before pointing somewhere in front of him. He turned to see what she had pointed at only to have an explosive fist hit him in the stomach he once again absorbed all of the power only leaving minor burns on his abdomen. "Seriously you should have realized the first time that that woul." he was suddenly cut off when the woman's feet slammed into the back of his head. He absorbed all the energy once again but the sheer weight behind the woman drove his face into the ground.

Alex now more than a little bit pissed was thoroughly pinned to the ground by the sheer weight that now sat calmly on his back. The logical side of his brain was currently trying to determine why he hadn't been crushed by the woman already. The emotional side however didn't pay attention to that because it was far more focused on the many ways he was going to beat the shit out of these two. He began to thrash violently releasing small amounts of his stored energy in hopes that he would shake the woman off of him. It didn't seem to have any effect because as soon as he was making progress the weight suddenly increased leaving him even more short of breath than he had already been. Deciding that that hadn't been the best plan he decided to stay put for a minute and think of a better strategy.

The man in red violently kicked him in the side of the head leaving behind nothing more than a burnt ear and singed hair as proof of the explosion. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and scowled down at him "you know kid you ain't as tough as you think you are."

"That might be true but you don't see me beating up a guy who can't fend for himself do you?" A vein visibly popped out of the man's forehead at that comment and Alex was about to throw more gas on the fire. But was stopped when the weight on his back increased again crushing the air out of him so he couldn't speak. The man scoffed and began walking away "I'm going to catch the rest of them. Keep him in check until I get back Ms. Valentine."

"Fine at least it won't be too difficult." She commented while shifting her weight to put more pressure on his ribs. This elicited a groan in response. As the man in red began to walk away neither agent noticed the slight smirk on their captives face. Alex launched both his arms above and brought them down on the ground hard releasing a truly massive blast of kinetic force straight into the ground. He along with Ms. Valentine were launched high into the air. Alex looked down at his handiwork as he fell back to the ground. Where he and the woman had just been was no longer a nice street as it had been instead it was a large dirt crater with concrete and jagged rubble surrounding it.

Alex crashed into the ground outside the crater but was back on his feet in a matter of moments. The woman however gracefully floated back to the ground with her umbrella. Alex let a sly smile slip onto his face as the woman landed. "Seriously what do you eat that makes you so damn heavy but still thin as paper. Or maybe that pretty shape is just an illusion and you're just some fat bitch underneath."

That comment wiped the sweat smile off her face and it was replaced with anger in moments. "I'll have you know I ate the Kilo kilo no mi and now I can change my weight anywhere from one to ten thousand kilograms."

Alex smirked and casually scratched his chin before saying. "Nah i'm not buying it I bet my last theory is the truth isn't it you whale." a vein bulged out on her forehead and her face went from anger to complete rage. She shot forward and delivered a kick straight to his abdomen with all the weight she could. He only stumbled back slightly from the sheer weight behind the kick but was unharmed as usual. He laughed "oh come on lady was that supposed to hurt."

He launched his own fist forward but she easily dodged the straight forward attack. But could feel the force rip past her knocking her back away from the fist she watched as the road was torn apart by seemingly nothing before it impacted a building which was obliterated by the blast. "Hmm your quick I'll give you that." the woman looked on horrified at the destruction caused by his attack vowing that she would not allow her to be hit by any of his attacks.

Alex suddenly jumped away as an explosive fist hit the ground where he had been standing moments before. "Well would you look who came back. If you had been a little quieter you might have actually hit me. Not that it would've done much for you."

"You may not get hurt by my explosions but if you think I didn't notice the burns left behind after each you must be an idiot." Mr. 5 commented.

"Nah these burns they barely sting trust me if you'd have been in my line of work you would feel the same way."

The man in red snarled and shot a kick at his abdomen Alex due to his combat training easily saw it coming and sidestepped the attack. Before dodging another fist from the man and jumping over a leg sweep from his partner. He landed and jumped away to get some distance between him and the two agents.

The man in red smirked before asking Alex. "If those burns don't hurt than why do you keep dodging our attacks instead of taking them like you did before? I can see you flinch every time you move one of them."

"Who said they didn't hurt all I said was that I have had way worse."

The man in red raised an eyebrow. "Then i guess you won't care if i make them worse then."

"Nope never said I would let you do that either."

The man in red only glared at him in response. Before blasting his partner into the sky. Alex looked up but realized his mistake almost immediately and barely dodged the fist from the one on the ground. He stepped backwards and grabbed the overextended arm before viciously headbutting his enemy he didn't charge enough energy in it to kill the man, but it would be enough to break his nose or even crack the skull depending on how he hit.

The man stumbled backwards holding a very bloody nose. He pulled the hand away revealing a bloody gash on his nose and cracked sunglasses. Alex heard the woman yell from above him. He spun around to try and get out of the way but was hit straight in the chest. He felt his body absorb the energy but when they hit the ground he could feel one of his ribs crack under the massive amount of weight the woman put on him. She jumped off him fast enough that that was the worst that happened but it could have been much worse for him. He rolled over gripping his chest in immense pain. He stood up after a few moments.

"Fine then if you guys want to be difficult I guess I'll have to try something new." He placed both hands on the ground and smiled to himself. "You know V would never let me even try this he said I would hurt myself before it did anything to my enemies. Well why don't we prove him wrong."

The two stared at him not sure what to expect they couldn't see anything happening. Alex stood up frowning to himself. " gotta admit I thought it would work faster."

That's when the two agents noticed a very subtle change around them the night air seemed to be growing warmer despite the sun not being out yet. Alex cursed to himself "Shit not enough power I guess." he pounded his fists together with a dramatic flare before waving for the two to come at him. The man in red charged for him and sent a fast jab to his face to which Alex dodged and grabbed the man by the neck. The man yelped in pain and slammed his fist down onto Alex's arm breaking his grip on Mr. 5's neck. This revealed a fairly severe burn on his neck in the shape of Alex's hand.

He reached up to touch the raw skin that had been seared by Alex but decided not to before he touched it. He growled. "What did you do?"

"Do either of you know what kinetic energy is or better yet how important it is?" they looked at him blankly and based off that Alex new they didn't. "Fine I guess I shouldn't have expected two mercenaries to have much schooling anyway. So then we can start with the basics shall we." Ms. Valentine lunged at him and sent a kick at his midsection he dodged to the side and spun to deliver a powerful elbow strike to her cheek. She slid back holding the bruised and scorched cheek in her right hand.

"Now that's no way to treat your teacher is it." Alex grinned in a rather sinister fashion. "Now the first thing you need to know is kinetic energy is the energy of motion. Everything that moves has kinetic energy." Mr. 5 brought his foot down intending to crush Alex's head. Alex responded by jumping into the air and then slamming his own foot on the man's head. He removed his foot from Mr. 5's head before continuing his speech. "You know even your explosions are just kinetic energy and heat. And that's my power I can absorb all kinetic energy i come in contact with and then control it." he accentuated his point by snapping his fingers and causing a small shock wave to travel outward.

Ms. Valentine was obviously growing scared as Alex advanced on them but Mr. 5 still stood defiant. "Who are you you bastard there shouldn't be anyone this strong at the entrance to the grand line!?" he lunged at Alex with intent to kill. Smoke rose from between Alex's fingers as he grabbed the other man's arm and used his own weight against him. His back was slammed into the cement with immense force. Leaving him in a large amount of pain both from his back and the fresh burn on his arm. He clutched the cooked skin on his right arm in pain before looking at Alex. "What kind of power is that you said it was the energy of motion then how in the hell can you get so hot?!"

"You probably don't know anything about atomic structures then either do you? if you can't figure that out. Well whatever molecules run on kinetic energy if they didn't have it how could electrons orbit the nucleus like they do. But in any case the more kinetic energy within an atom or molecule the hotter it becomes. So all i have to do is charge my molecules with kinetic energy to make them heat up." Alex walked up closer to the man and hauled him up by his arm and threw him next to his partner.

Mr. 5 coughed to injured to fight back anymore. Kneeled in front of the two "so any last words Mr. 5 or are you to stubborn to accept your own death." Mr. 5 spat blood in Alex's face.

He calmly wiped the blood away from his eyes before standing up and pulling his shirt up to reveal a magnum holstered at his side. He pulled the pistol out and calmly slid back the slide to put a bullet in the chamber. "You know I try to be a nice guy give you a chance to redeem yourself if only a little depending on what you said I might have let you live but that little stunt just proved to me that you don't deserve my mercy." He put the gun up to the other man's forehead but all Alex could see was defiance in his eyes.

He sighed "I may have been trained to get rid of people like you but this will always be hard for me." With that said he pulled the trigger and felt the gun kick against his grip sending the bullet straight through the man's skull. Ms. Valentine screamed in horror as her partner fell to the ground dead. Alex got between her and her partner and kicked her away. She sat before him terrified wondering what he would do. He put the gun away and kneeled in front of her.

"Look lady I don't want to kill you but if you ever come after us again i won't hesitate I'm not nearly as kind hearted as the captain I travel with. And before I go I have a message for you to give to your boss. Tell him that his crimes won't be forgiven as a member of the UNSC I will hunt him down."

She nodded in terror wanting more than anything for the man to leave. Alex shook his head and walked away holding his chest to keep the pain at bay. He was in a very somber mood as he made his way to the ship.


	11. Negotiations

**Author's note: Hi everyone back here with the next chapter of forging on. From now on I will be switching between the trio and the crew of the infinity almost every chapter. At least until they meet up once again. Just a fair warning for anyone wanting more from either group. I was originally planning to put in the fight between Maddie and Osiris but I decided that Ace vs. Blue Team would be more entertaining. Again if anyone wants to be a beta reader please let me know**

 **Valtek: i would say the straw hats aren't going to be shown up by the trio when they are together they'll be pretty even that being said the straw hats aren't the main focus my characters and the rest of the infinities crew are the main focus.**

 **Disclaimer: I own nothing**

Maddie looked around as the command deck prepared for the captain's departure to negotiate with the royals of Alabasta. Several Huragok floated around giving reports to the various officers about the functionality of the pelicans the small group would be taking to conduct their business. The group in question consisted of her the Captain and Blue team in case first contact with the culture went south. She at the moment was being fit with a thin sheet of armor that could go unseen under the uniform Laskey had requested she wear to show her new found standing as his tactical officer. They also had a small holster strapped to her hip and had given her a magnum to accompany it.

She exited the small room that held the armory meant specifically if the command center were ever to be invaded. The man running it had made quick work of his job taking measurements and finding the armor that would fit her form the best. It wasn't exactly a comfortable experience but she understood the importance and the man had remained professional the entire time. Which she greatly appreciated.

She walked over to Captain Lasky who was in the middle of a conversation with Palmer. "Look Palmer I realize that there are people more qualified for this than you but Chief and Blue team are coming with me and I don't trust Halsey or Osiris to make important decisions while i'm gone. I'd even expect Halsey to go behind my back some how." Palmer nodded after a moment of thought.

"Fine I'll do my best to lead in your stead until you return."

He replied with a simple thank you and then addressed Roland. "Can you bring up a basewide transmission I want to make sure everyone knows what's going on before we depart."

"Done the comms are all yours captain."

With a nod of thanks he cleared his throat and began the transmission. " Alright everyone this is Captain Thomas Lasky and I would like to inform everyone of our current situation. Recently you may have noticed more activity in the hangars and I know for a fact there are rumors floating around about our current objective. I would like to put those to rest by saying that we have found a massive supply of untapped resources in the territory of a nearby country. A small group myself included is going to go and see the leadership and negotiate an agreement that will allow us to tap into these resources. From this point until we return from negotiations Commander Palmer will be the ranking officer. We are anticipating at most a day but depending on the situation the negotiation may run longer. That's all I wanted to say keep up the goodwork while I'm away."

Palmer walked up to the captain after he had finished his speech and asked "when will you be leaving?"

"In about an hour that'll give us time to finish checking everything over." He then turned to Maddie and saw her in the new uniform he had provided for her. "Well Maddie that definitely looks good on you wear it with pride."

She smiled at the captain and thanked him before looking over the notes she had made out once more. Carefully examining the plans she decided to go down to check on the preparations in the hangar. She arrived to see blue team along with several engineers preparing their pelican for the trip. She walked up to Chief to ask if everything she had requested was prepared.

"Hello Chief is everything ready? Including the translator I asked for?"

He turned to her and answered her. "Yes we have everything right here and the translators you wanted are right here." He handed her a small case which she opened to make sure they were ready. Inside were two small headsets meant for her and Captain Lasky. She carefully pulled out the one and placed it on her head. "Roland can you say something in another language i want to make sure these work. The response was a message in a language she didn't recognize. But that was quickly fixed by the headset.

A mechanical voice came over it and said. "They work fine Maddie don't worry."She smiled and thanked him which the headset translated to the foreign language for her. She took it off and carefully placed it back in the case.

Fred jumped down from on top of the pelican and turned to maddie with a question. "Pardon me Ma'am but what do we need those for we've already interacted with locals and in english no less."

"It's more of a precaution than anything else in case the people there do speak another language you spartans have this tech built into your helmets but the Captain and I will need these if we want to understand a different dialect."

"Alright just wanted to know. By the way will we be going over the plan again Chief feels like you neglected to tell him the LZ. He thinks you're trying to hide something."

"um well he isn't entirely wrong i didn't tell him because I couldn't determine what the best course of action would be in that respect. I wanted to have a private meeting between the six of us to decide on that."

"I'll let Chief know we'll talk about it in the pelican's troop bay before we leave." he walked into the pelican presumably to talk to the leader of his team. Maddie breathed a sigh of relief. After the short conversation was over. She had been terrified of the Spartans ever since Osiris tried to capture her after her escape. Blue team was supposedly even more skilled than them so she had decided to stay on their good side if at all possible.

She only had to wait about ten more minutes before Captain Lasky showed up for their departure. She told him about the discussion they needed to have about the landing zone. He agreed to hear their two options and help to make the decision.

The six who would be participating in the negotiations met in the troop bay of the pelican to talk about their options regarding their approach to the capital. "Alright so as far as I can tell we have two options about how we approach this. We could land outside of the capital and walk the rest of the distance that will prevent a panic in the palace, but it also runs the risk of us being arrested before we even reach the king due to Blue Team's bounty from the world government. Our other option is we land unannounced in the palace courtyard and risk causing a massive panic among the guards and regular citizens. That at least gives us a higher chance of meeting the king but it raises possible trust issues between us." maddie finished and left the topic open for discussion between the rest of them.

Surprisingly Chief was the first to speak up. "The best course of action would be to land in the courtyard that will give us the best chance of completing the mission."

Lasky replied to that comment shortly after. "That might be true but the trust issues brought on by it would probably be worse than if they only knew about your bounties. Even if we do do that it could be seen as hostile and we may be barred from seeing the king."

Kelly butted in to place her own opinion on the table. "With all due respect Captain if we want the best chance of securing these resources Chief is right going directly to the leaders of the country is our best course of action."

"I understand that but those resources aren't guaranteed no matter what we do without outright stealing from the Alabastan territory. And parking ourselves in the palace courtyard may reduce our chances more than increase it."

The whole thing devolved into a heated argument about which was the best option. Each side gave valid points about the reasoning behind their decision eventually Lasky got tired of his argument with Blue Team and suggested a compromise. "Fine if the four of you are so adamantly against this then how about we compromise. We'll land outside of the city but instead of having you escort us Maddie and I enter the city while you lag behind and stay unnoticed you'll have to be far enough away that if you are caught we." he said gesturing between him and Maddie. "Won't be associated with you but close enough to intervene should the situation grow dire." he looked at Blue Team to see if there was any objections and when he saw none he told them to prepare for departure.

Maddie sat in the back of the pelican going over every aspect of what could go wrong with the wrench Lasky had thrown into her plan. They could get to far from blue team and be defenseless. One of the Spartans could be seen sneaking around causing an uproar in the city. And worst of all they could end up not being allowed into the castle in that case blue team would have to intervene anyway. There were too many variables to consider in this new idea Lasky had suggested. That's not to say it couldn't work it could but she preferred a much higher level of control than this.

The Captain seemed to take notice of her discomfort sat down next to her. "You don't approve of my idea do you?"

"That's not it it is our best option now that I've thought about it but their are so many things that could go wrong it's making me uneasy is all."

"Don't worry every plan will hit a snag down the road eventually. Even if i hadn't suggested that your plans would have come across something you couldn't predict. We need to give ourselves the greatest chance of success we can get our hands on."

"I know Captain but that doesn't mean I can't worry."

He nodded and walked back to the cockpit to discuss matters with Chief.

At full speed it took just under an Hour to reach the Capital of Alabasta Chief set the pelican down a behind a bank of dunes just outside the city to prevent it from being spotted by the locals. With that the small group of six got ready to depart maddie and the Captain loaded their magnums while blue team checked over their own gear. They all departed together blue team splitting up into a half mile radius around their two representatives. Getting into the city was fairly easy but finding their way to the palace proved to be a bit more challenging. The two kept getting turned around on the many streets that made up the city. Eventually they needed to have Linda doing recon with her sniper and relaying directions to the other five people.

Maddie got lost in her thoughts as they made their way through the crowded streets. She noticed things about the city that she had not expected. The most prominent being the apparent health of the citizens despite their rather primitive technology especially with the climate they called home. Another was the crowds of people that seemed curious about their unusual attire which only served to intensify her anxiety. It was a bit of a relief to her when they finally made it to the palace grounds. And were inside the gates.

The guards had been sceptical of their claim of being foreign diplomats. Which was to be expected. Lasky was nothing if not persuasive however he emphasized the dire circumstances they were under several times before the guards finally conceded and let them through the gates.

Maddie was trying to resist her urge to smile as she saw her plan working flawlessly so far. The meeting room they had requested for their audience with the king had been seen to almost immediately and the two now waited patiently for the king to arrive. Maddy tapped her nails on the table due to the trepidation she felt towards meeting the Monarch. She glanced out the window and saw one of the four spartans peek in from the side. She silently wondered how the four could manage to reach such a high ledge but brushed it aside as the doors to the room opened once again.

Maddie glanced over to Lasky expectantly and received a nod of confirmation that he knew what to do should anything go wrong.

The king wasn't the rich snob that Maddie had half expected him to be. He wore a beautifully designed robe and almost radiated power and kindness. He sat down across from them. The two parties stayed quiet for a moment and sized each other up.

The King was the first to break the silence. "Well then why don't we introduce ourselves I'm Nefeltari Cobra current king of Alabasta. and who might you two be?"

The captain introduced the two of them. " My name Captain Thomas Lasky of the UNSC Infinity and this is my tactical officer Madison Newman." Maddie bowed her head in greeting as Lasky told her name. The King raised an eyebrow at the introduction then spoke once more.

"That is an odd title would i be right to assume that UNSC is your nation and Infinity is the name of your ship."

The captain nodded to the question asked of him to which the king smiled at his correct assumption.

"Well then i'm sure the two of you aren't here for pleasantries what was the urgent matter the two of you wanted to bring to my attention?"

Lasky glanced over at Maddie to make sure now was a good time to tell him. She nodded to the Captain for him to continue.

"We'll be honest with you your highness we know your country is under threat from the organisation known as Baroque Works, and we believe my organisation and your country could benefit if we cooperate."

The king's gaze hardened ever so slightly before asking. "What do you propose?"

"The UNSC is the military branch of our government we are prepared to have our men aid your guards in any suspicious activity involving Baroque Works starting with the removal of wanted pirates from your borders."

"What's the catch?"

"Well currently my ship is separated from home and we need a large amount of resources to return. Several miles north of here under the desert is a massive supply of these resources we want your permission to mine for them."

The king seemed to think on the subject for a moment before asking another question. "How far are you prepared to go for that right?"

"We're fully prepared to help until either Baroque Works is Destroyed or to the point at which you decide we are not needed before then."

The king studied them for a moment before sighing. "You seem like trustworthy people but if this arrangement is going to work their are some things you need to know about Baroque Works." the king then nudged a guard and asked him to go retrieve something. The guard returned after several minutes with a large stack of papers and two pictures which he handed to the king. The king took the pictures and placed them in front of his two guests. He pointed to the image of a blue haired girl. "This is my daughter she is currently working undercover as part of Baroque Works and feeding me information. And this." he said pointing to a man with a scar across his face and a large gold hook in the place of one of his hands. " is Crocodile my daughter has confirmed he is the leader and plans to overthrow me."

"Then this makes things much easier rather than rooting out suspects we could cut the head off the snake from the start leaving the rest defenseless!" Maddie said in excitement.

The King shook his head. " It's not that simple my people see Crocodile as a public hero despite being a known pirate. If one of my allies killed him the result might be just as bad and have my people turn against me."

Maddie deflated slightly but spoke up again. "In that case we should continue how Lasky and I originally planned we remove known pirates from the country but instead of removing suspects it removes Crocodile's possible allies."

"Maddie is right doing that would weaken his group significantly especially with your help."

"That would seem like a good start to me as well I had this guard bring me a list of known pirates in or around my country. That should be a great help when your men go after them." The guard handed maddie the pile of wanted posters he was holding. She absentmindedly flipped through the posters while the Captain and king continued their discussion. A few caught her eye mainly due to the odd titles some seemed to possess Fire fist Ace was a great example of this. Two posters in particular stopped her dead in her tracks on one was a picture of her brother and the other his best friend Vykan. She threw the others aside and looked at every detail provided on the two posters. The posters had been issued just over a month ago long after the two had been declared KIA. She jumped up and showed the picture to the king tears of hope welling up in her eyes.

"Do you know where these two are?!" she asked frantically. The king seemed taken aback by the sudden action but composed himself easily enough.

"Well they were last seen on whiskey peak about a week ago traveling with this pirate." he said holding up a picture of a smiling pirate with a straw hat on his head. "Might I ask why the sudden interest in these two in particular."

Maddie sat back in her chair and didn't respond the news that her brother was most likely alive had shocked her into silence. Lasky didn't have the same issue and took the papers to examine what could cause Maddie to have such an outburst. He raised an eyebrow at the names and pictures written on the paper and was almost as shocked as his new officer. "Well they were both extremely skilled soldiers under my command but we believed they had died in a crash several months ago. Obviously that's not the case. This one." he said sliding the poster of Alex over to the king. "Is her brother." gesturing towards Maddie

"Well that does explain her reaction and as for our Alliance I trust you will begin in your side of the bargain as soon as possible."

"Yes but first you must meet a few of my men." he tapped a button on his earpiece and instructed blue team to make their presence known to the king.

Cobra was surprised as the windows to the room opened and four massive armoured beings pulled themselves inside. The four made their way to their captain's side and stood in silence behind him.

Captain Lasky took that chance to introduce them "This is Blue Team the most skilled soldiers I have under my command they will remain here and begin removing the pirates while I and Maddie go back to retrieve the rest of our men as well as mining equipment."

The king looked at the 4 massive figures behind his new ally and decided he had made a good choice in accepting their help. He thought a moment about the situation this put his people in and how much of these resources they needed. They shouldn't need enough to starve the country of natural resources. He thought of something for a moment and then asked his guard to retrieve a seastone knife for the Leader of Blue Team. Once that had been done he took the blade and sheath in his hands before getting up and presenting it to the man in green armor. He then turned to address them all. "That knife is made of seastone it is the only thing besides Haki that can hurt some devil fruit users. Please use it wisely. We have very few weapons like that but I'll give you this one as a sign of trust."

Chief nodded to the king in thanks for the gift. He placed it on his hip opposite where he kept his normal combat knife.

Lasky got up and shook the king's hand "Pleasure working with you." The UNSC representatives began walking out but Lasky seemed to realize something " Within the next few days some of our massive mining equipment will be flying over the city make sure you warn the populace so we don't accidentally cause a panic." The king seemed shocked for a moment but shook it off and assured him that he would.

Lasky got into the cockpit of the pelican and began starting the engines to return to their island base. Maddie meanwhile was briefing Blue team on what they were to do while her and the captain went to get everyone else. The cheerful smile that was stuck on her face did not help convey the severity of the situation. "Now all we need you to do is start removing the pirates from the kingdom preferably by driving them out or handing them over to the guard. The king has allowed you to execute some should they put up to much of a fight."

"Maddie they know what they're doing now get in here so we can get going!"

"Alright Captain i'm coming."she waved goodbye to the spartans before shutting the cargo door.

After the pelican took off Fred turned to Chief. "So how are we going to do this prioritise higher value targets or bring down any pirates we happen to come across?"

"We start at the port cities pirates are more likely to be there than this far inland we look for high value targets first but stop any others we find on the way. Newman was kind enough to upload a digital file of every wanted poster to our HUDs. If anyone locates a target with a value over 150,000,000 should be dealt with as a team we don't know the full extent of their abilities."

Chief slammed the small pirates face into the concrete ground and brought the battered criminal back up unconscious. He threw the man over his shoulder and started walking to the nearest guard barracks where he could hand the pirate over to the local law enforcement. So far none of his team had found a target that needed their complete attention most of the ones they had found where just underlings to more significant threats he reached the barracks after several minutes and handed him over as they had agreed on. He left to go scout for more of the lowlifes but his comms finally came to life after an hour of silence. "Chief I found something you'll want to see we may need everyone if this man's bounty is any indication of how dangerous he is."

"I here you Linda we'll meet at your location keep your eyes on that target don't lose him.

Twenty more minutes saw the other three spartans standing atop a small roof beside their sniper. "He's uh sleeping." fred commented dryly. all four looked down at their newest target.

"Linda has he done anything since you spotted him?"

"No I first saw him about half an hour ago he was just walking around but he seemed out of place so i tracked him for a while until my HUD identified him. I contacted you as soon as it did."

"How long has he been sleeping on that bench?"

"Just under ten minutes now."

Chief seemed to consider his option for a moment after he saw the massive bounty on the man's head. "Linda we'll go down there and confront him you stay up here if things get out of hand you take a shot and bring him down."

Ace was peacefully sleeping on a small bench in the park enjoying the desert sun on his skin. His hat rested over his face to block out the sun so he could nap without any issues. He barely registered the heavy footsteps coming towards him due to him being half asleep already.

A commanding voice suddenly pierced through his relaxation. "Portgas D. Ace?"

He lifted his hat up and saw three massive people in thick armor looking down at him. "Yes." he said somewhat annoyed at the interruption from the three "What do you want?"

"You're a pirate we work for the king of Alabasta either leave the country or you'll be placed under arrest."

Ace just pulled his hat back over his face and replied. "Nah I have to meet someone here so i won't be doing that."

Chief grabbed the man and pulled him up off the bench "Alright then you'll have to come with us."

Ace looked at the man that had disrupted his peace with no small amount of annoyance. "Look i don't have anything against you guys and I have things I need to do so just leave me alone." Ace shoved the man off roughly sending him stumbling away from the force.

Fred and kelly grabbed the man from behind to restrain him and bring him to the guard. Ace however whirled around and punched fred in the visor sending him to the ground. Kelly jumped back and pulled out her battle rifle and took aim at the pirate the other spartans got back to their feet and raised their weapons. Kelly spoke up "I suggest you stand down right now."

Ace looked at all 3 around him and replied with a simple no. A loud bang suddenly rang out and a hole was blasted through the man's chest where his heart was. Flames licked around where the wound was before closing back up in a matter of seconds. He looked up to where it came from and saw the fourth member of the group. His expression had shifted from annoyance to anger after the shot that should have killed him.

"Alright if you guys aren't going to let this be then I guess we'll have to do this." he dropped his bag and his fingers burst into flames prepared to fight the spartans head on.

Chief took the first shot at the man but the bullets passed through him harmlessly the pirate simply stared at him unimpressed by the weapons they all had. Chief put the rifle away and pulled out the knife the king had given him. He then spoke to his team in their private comms. "The knife The king gave me may be the only thing that can hurt him. The three of you lay cover fire for me it may not hurt him but it can distract him." they all replied with an affirmative before they shot into action. Kelly,Fred and Linda aimed at him and started firing he dodged many of the bullets but the few that grazed him merely passed through as the ones before them did.

Chief slinked into the shadows away from the fight to try and catch the man off guard. He charged forward while the pirate was distracted and tried to stab him from behind. Ace seemed to sense it coming however because he jumped into the air out of the way. Ace turned around in the air and formed pistols from his hands "Higan!" he yelled out sending sending several small pellets of fire flying at chief. Chief rolled out of the way not wanting to know how strong the bullets actually were. Ace landed a short distance away and pulled his arm back his fist cloaked in an immense amount of fire. "Hiken!" he launched his fist forward sending a massive fireball flying straight at the spartans. Two of the spartans dove out of the way but chief didn't have the time and was caught in it dead center. The fire nearly burned through his shields entirely leaving him disoriented from the heat. Ace shot forward intent to knock out what seemed to be the leader of the group.

Fred barely managed to intercept the powerful fist his shields nearly shattered from the impact but he managed to defend Chief. Kelly blindsided the pirate and tackled him to the ground. Ace threw her off of him and crossed two fingers in front of him. And aimed at the roof Linda was perched on. "Jujika!" a beam of pure fire launched at the roof so fast that Linda barely had time to jump down out of the way. He followed her with the beam intent on getting rid of one of them the beam melted through the building as if it were nothing and would have ended Linda. Had chief not jumped up and stabbed the pirate in the shoulder with his seastone knife. That drew actual blood and cut off the attack before it could hurt a member of his team. Chief yanked the knife out and jumped back as a fist coated in flame spun around to hit him. Chief glanced at the bloody wound in their opponent's shoulder and then at the knife he had used.

He grabbed the blade and used his bare hands to snap the blade into 4 jagged fragments and tossed one to each of his teammates. The four rushed in with the goal of killing the pirate. Ace smirked to himself and crouched down summoning a large amount of fire around his feet. "Enkai." he muttered to himself. And just as the four were upon him he yelled out. "Hibashira!" a massive pillar of fire launched straight upward sending the spartans flying upward with it. As the attack ended the spartans landed with several powerful crashes into the ground. All their armor almost glowing from the immense heat of the attack not a single one moved from their position on the ground.

Ace smiled to himself pleased with his work. He grabbed his bag up off the ground and slung it back over his shoulder. Before walking away to a less exciting location. "I wonder if Luffy has got my message yet." he thought out loud. Ten minutes later the four armored figures began to rise to their feet each having a new respect for the strength the people of this planet had.


	12. Lesson learned

**Author's note: Hello to all my loyal followers i'm back with another chapter of forging on. We are back to the trio and the strawhats for this chapter. This chapter has a major focus on Alex and his recovery from his last fight and something about him I've been very subtly hinting at. Lets see if anyone can figure it out with the more obvious evidence in this chapter. And sorry this chapter took so long i couldn't figure out how to reveal this LITTLE aspect of Alex's personality. Sorry if the chapter is a bit short but i really wanted to focus on one thing in this chapter and any extra detail would take away from that. Anyway hope you enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I dont own Halo or One Piece**

"I told you doing that was a horrible idea" Vykan pointed out with no small amount of irritation as he dabbed a cold towel over Alex's smouldering torso.

Alex hissed out a curse as the clothes touched his charred skin. "Yeah i get it it was a bad idea. Now can't you just helYAHH!" vykan released the small amount of pressure he had put behind his hand and shook his head as a insincere apology.

"Alex this whole situation is your own doing i'll help you as much as I can but you get to face the consequences on your own you'll be bedridden for weeks if your lucky. Honestly I'm surprised you made it back to the ship in the shape you're in. You pretty much cooked yourself from the inside out if it had been just the surface i could help you easily but because the burns are mostly focused in the muscle i can't the only thing you can do is stay in bed until i say you can get up. If you ever want to walk again I would take that advice."

"Yeah yeah fine I will. Just make sure you don't get into too much trouble while I'm out of commission."

"Alex you shouldn't be talking i deliberately told you that idea of yours was stupid and now look at you."

"Yeah but it was damn cool when I did it scared the shit out of that woman."

"And look at yourself you're gonna be stuck in bed for weeks because of it."

"Alright I learned my lesson I won't do that again its stupid how much this hurts."

"Well several weeks of bedrest and you'll be fine just don't do anything to aggravate your injuries."

Alex laid his head back on the pillow and reached his bandaged right arm up to rub his forehead. "whatever you say doc."

Vykan shook his head and walked out of the small cabin luffy had given Alex for the duration of his recovery.

Vykan walked out to see the Nalia and Vivi standing outside the door. Nalia was the first to address him. "So is he ok?"

"Yes he'll be fine a couple weeks of bedrest is all he needs."

"Well that's good i was worried it would be worse than that but the strongest member of our little group will be out of commission on the next island and there's no telling what will be there."

"We'll address that when the time comes but for now he needs bed rest and good food to recover quickly."

"I'll make sure that idiot cook keeps him fed well he can't seem to resist the request of a specimen such as myself." Nalia grinned and pulled the collar of her shirt down slightly to accentuate her point.

Vivi giggled and blushed slightly at her friends point having seen the cooks antics for herself. Before assuring the confused looking alien. "Sanji will listen to us alex will be taken care of."

Vykan looked between the two lost as to what had just transpired before him. He shook his head deciding it was just one of the human things he had not yet come to understand. Despite his years spent fighting alongside the race. He decided he would go keep to himself for now preferably away from these people and their strange ways. With a shake of his head in annoyance he said one thing before walking away. "Just keep Alex healthy."

Alex scoffed to himself as he ate the food he had been provided he angrily bit into the steak sanji had cooked to perfection. Of course only a week after he started recovering they had arrived on a new island and he was stuck on the ship while the rest of the crew got to explore their new surroundings. Vykan was the only one to stay behind with him but his alien companion was nowhere to be found at the moment. He grabbed a book off the dresser beside him and dove into it determined to salvage some kind of entertainment. But that didn't stave off his boredom and he soon fell asleep.

He awoke with a book resting over his face to which he was not very happy with he pulled the book off his nose and threw the book back onto the nightstand he leaned back and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. Once that was done he sat up and stretched out his back putting his arms back down he noticed a piece of paper stuck to his sweaty right forearm. He peeled the corner off his arm to see what it was. He didn't know what to expect a note or something maybe but this caught him off guard. It was an intricate drawing of Luffy down to the very smallest detail. Their were measurements all over the drawing for height arm and leg length even several possible weights to the side of it.

Above the drawing was several paragraphs of extremely small writing discussing possible weaknesses strengths even estimations about how far he could stretch his body. The paragraph next to it seemed to be a strategy about how to beat him. Which consisted of getting him angry and then luring him to a standing water supply or if that was not available extreme heat would be the best option covenant plasma weapons being the source of that heat.

Alex scratched his head a bit confused about who would have left this in his room. He sat the paper off to one side of him but noticed the small stack of papers each one held a drawing of one of his new companions. The drawings just like the first were accurate to the smallest detail and each contained similar descriptions of the person in the sketch. What alarmed him was the amount of detail present within the counter strategies for each person. Ussop Nami and Vivi were written off as non threats but the rest however weren't given the same treatment. Nalia and luffy were the two biggest threats to whoever wrote these.

The strategy against Nalia was about luring her to water or if that doesn't work use her enhanced sense against her very loud noises or particularly foul smells would most likely force her back into a full human state due to how severe her senses would make those. He also found detailed body measurements of all three of her forms as well as estimated capabilities of each.

Sanji and zoro were noted to have monstrous strength for their size, zoro in particular had several sketches of his odd 3 sword fighting style and how it could be countered their were few strategies but one was to blind him somehow so that he could no longer track his opponents movement. And to disarm and subdue him from there.

Sanji was fairly straight forward based on the fact that he never used his hands during a fight to the point that he even blocked most of the time with his legs as well. The strategy was to overwhelm his defensive abilities by using hand as well as foot combat to give them the edge in a fight. At least that was the strategy if guns were unavailable. He threw away the last paper to reveal a paper with large writing reading. "We can't trust them."

Alex sat the papers aside and leaned back in the bed he would have to ask Vykan about this when he next saw him this seemed like a pretty important turn of events.

Vykan honestly didn't care if they had to stay on the island for the log pose to record it that didn't require the entire ship to disembark. And yet the captain had insisted he accompany him on his little outing and had got us into this whole mess. The idiot was lucky they hadn't been killed by the mercenaries waiting on the island. He was currently lugging himself back to the ship nalia was supporting half of his weight since the wax he had taken in had weakened him more than it had the humans. He could only assume it was because sangheili lungs were more specialized than human ones. He had noticed that due to some humans habit of smoking his kinds body seemed to be admittedly less durable than humans in that aspect. Not that he would admit that to anyone of course.

For now he just wanted to get back to the ship and off the damn island. He honestly wanted to have some of the chefs food and then check on Alex after that a long nap was in order mainly for his body to recover from the days events. They arrived back at the ship and ate a small dinner to prepare for the following morning since the giants had promised to help them get off the island. After the food vykan felt good enough to walk to check on Alex. He found Alex sitting on the bed closely examining a small stack of papers. He looked up when he walked in. " Hi V did you draw these i found them in here when i woke up from a nap? Do you not trust any of them?"

Vykan looked at him curiously wondering why his friend seemed so concerned at the moment. He grabbed the offered papers and looked them over lazily at first but that grew into alarm when he saw exactly what was written on each. "No Alex I've never seen these before. But can i take these to look into i have a bad feeling about this."

Alex looked both relieved and more concerned at the same time "Yeah i don't want them they make me nervous to be honest. By the way can you get something for me to eat im starving?"

"Yes Alex I'll be back shortly." with that said he quickly left the room his fist clenched and shook violently when he was out of Alex's view a scowl tore across his face as he set off to find Nalia he found her talking to Nami on the deck of the ship. He grabbed her and pulled her away from the other woman.

"What the hell V I was talking to her!" but her protest was cut short when she saw the look of rage mixed with intense worry written all over the aliens features. "Vykan what's wrong did something happen?!"

"We need a private place to talk until we get there all I can say is that Alex has been away from our ship for far to long."

Nalia looked at him dumbfounded but nodded and they made their way into the depths of the ship.


End file.
